England have "lots of opportunities to win this game", says Will Jacks

Jacks picked up three of the seven Pakistan wickets to fall on day three and is under clear instruction from Ben Stokes to bowl his best ball as much as possible

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Will Jacks is confident England can force a result in Rawalpindi, stating "there's so much time left in the game".

Abdullah Shafique, Imam-ul-Haq and Babar Azam all brought up centuries for the home side on day three but England fought back with seven wickets to leave the match nicely poised for a bold declaration in the final two days. Pakistan closed on 499 for 7 and trail England by 158 runs.

"It finished up being a great day for us. Seven wickets in the day is very good and we'll be pushing to get those three wickets as quick as possibly in the morning and giving them a score to chase," Jacks said.

"There's so much time left in the game. We scored those runs so quickly on day one and two that we have given ourselves the best possible opportunity to win this game. They've played well, they've batted for a long time but there's still two full days left on a wicket that is deteriorating, so there's going to be lots of opportunities to win this game."

Jacks believes the pitch is beginning to deteriorate, creating turn and reverse for the bowlers. However, for much of the first three days both sides have toiled with the ball with little reward, something Jacks believes England only overcame because of the positive environment created by Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum.

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Jacks celebrates taking the wicket of Babar Azam [Aamir Qureshi/Getty Images]

"When you're doing that with guys you know well and are friends with it makes it easier. That's the environment Stokes and McCullum have been building and it's a team you want to play for," he said. "Days like today, if you're not tight as a unit, they'd have finished 500 for 2. I think it's a tap on the back for us that we've come through that and finished strongly in the last hour."

The Surrey batter, who only found out he was making his Test debut a few minutes before receiving his cap, was responsible for three of those wickets, accounting for Shafique, Babar and Naseem Shah, and has bowled 33 overs in the first innings – only the second time in his career he has "clocked 30 overs". And his strategy, under instruction from Stokes, has been simple.

"The message to me is no matter what the field is try and bowl to take wickets. It'll be communicated if he wants me to do something  different, but he wants it to stay simple for me: try and bowl my best ball as much as possible," he said.

"A couple of times today we searched and bowled wide just because there was nothing happening on the straight, so we changed out plan and it worked for the first wicket. Then we went back to the stumps later on. It's just being flexible."

As for dismissing Babar, he added: "Bit of disbelief really. First ball of a spell, bit of a loosener outside off and he cut it to point. If we go on to win this Test that could be seen as a big moment in the game: to take the wicket of Babar and then Rizwan in the next over and one more in the last hour.

"Bowling is getting more enjoyable the more I get better at it, and it's something I'm incredibly keen to get as good as I can at so I can play for England as an allrounder."


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