Some overnight rain probably helped to delay the docility of the pitch as Dion Ebrahim and Masakadza went out to face Waqar Younis and Shoaib Akhtar.

The sky remained overcast, although more rain was not imminent, but the light might prove a problem later in the day.

Ebrahim, who has not been in good form since his maiden century a month ago, took advantage of overpitched deliveries from both and reached double figures in the fourth over with some skilful drives. Then he edged a ball at catchable height off Waqar between fourth slip and gully to the boundary.

Pakistan plugged the gap so they had six fielders in the slip-gully region.

Two more fours followed through the gaps, so Ebrahim scored all of the first 22 runs on the board before Masakadza finally pushed Shoaib for a single past gully.

Shoaib often passed the 150km/hr mark without unduly troubling the batsmen on a slow pitch. Masakadza was never fluent, though, and had only 9 to his credit when he unwisely tried to hook the erratic Mohammad Sami and gloved a catch to the keeper; Zimbabwe 36 for one.

Shoaib then decided that a yorker was the answer: one turned into a low lightning-fast full toss that bowled Campbell for 2, too far across his stumps and playing across the line, and beat Grant Flower only just outside off stump first ball. Sami responded by raising his game and a lifter took Ebrahim (31) by surprise, bouncing off his gloves to Inzamam at first slip.

This brought the Flower brothers together to face a sudden but not unusual crisis against bowling that looked suddenly lethal.

Masakadza’s indiscretion had cost his team more dearly than he could have thought.

Andy Flower soon put Sami in his place with two effortless off-side boundaries. Grant looked much less comfortable, but hung on as only he can. Unfortunately Andy’s master class was cut short by umpire Venkat, who adjudged him caught behind down the leg side, off the thigh pad, off Sami, for 29. Zimbabwe were struggling at 76 for four.