"When you've seen the ball behave as it has done on occasions in this match you ideally wouldn't want to be chasing more than 150."
Bob Willis Quotes of the week

The hosts recovered from 54-4 to reach stumps on 125-4 in their second innings - a lead of 55 - thanks to an unbroken fifth-wicket stand of 71 between Azhar Ali (34) and Asad Shafiq (35).

The picture looked very different when Misbah-ul-Haq fell lbw to Monty Panesar (3-44) for 12 with Pakistan still 16 runs in arrears.

Willis reflected: "England at that stage must have had hopes of bowling Pakistan out for under 150 but it looks as though they are going to have to work a little bit harder than that.

"They are going to have to be careful because the new ball is a long way away still - they are going to have to set sensible fields until they break this partnership.

"It would appear to me that the older the ball the gets, the less it does for the spinners so England are going to have to work hard to level this series.

"It was a great fight-back by the two young Pakistanis and all of a sudden when a partnership develops - much as with Alastair Cook and Jonathan Trott yesterday - the pitch seems to be doing less.

"The ball isn't zipping past the outside edge anymore. They've played in a very calm manner really, really well. I've been most impressed by them.

"Pakistan's held England up in Dubai when they thought they were going to blow them away there, so it doesn't always collapse like a pack of cards.

"They are going to have to keep working hard. They'll have a very close eye on the scoreboard and what that lead is.

"Michael Atherton was making that point that it would appear that in modern Test cricket it is becoming easier to bat in the fourth innings than it used to be and more sides are winning batting last.

"But when you've seen the ball behave as it has done on occasions in this match you ideally wouldn't want to be chasing more than 150."

Fantastic

England began the day on 207-5 in their first innings, 50 runs behind Pakistan, and quickly suffered another setback when Matt Prior fell to Saeed Ajmal for three.

However Stuart Broad struck an unbeaten 58 off just 62 balls - including six fours and one six - to earn the tourists a crucial advantage.

"We've been full of praise for this Pakistani partnership but before those two came together and stopped the rot it had been one-way traffic," said Willis.

"First of all Stuart Broad this morning - plus a little taste from Graeme Swann as well - and then the early wickets from Panesar in the Pakistani second innings.

"It was a fantastic innings from Broad - possibly the match-winning one. Time will only tell on that but he is such a clean striker of the ball.

"He's got this ability to pick up the length of the ball very early and you can tell from the way that he talks that he considers himself a genuine batsman.

"Broad has had time to reflect on his progress - two long periods out injured, first in the Ashes, then in the World Cup.

"I think that the queue of bowlers must have registered with Stuart; England are probably better off than any other country in the world - when all of their seam bowlers are fit they've got eight or 10 to pick from who wouldn't let their country down.

"He knows he's got to bowl well every time otherwise someone is going to be breathing down his neck. But the advantage he's got, even if he has a couple of off days with the ball, is that not too many of that taxi queue behind him are going to bat anything like him."