This has been an odd Test match, existing in its own realm: stripped of any kind of context, offering no glimpse into the future, or information about the past. Pakistan's most important characters in Multan are two spinners aged 38 and 31, whom they thought they had moved on from, and will invariably soon have to discard again. The core of the bowling attack has been released from the squad, and will likely return for the next series away in South Africa. England don't play another Test in Asia after this series till February 2027, and will swiftly move on to higher-profile challenges against India and Australia next year.
You'd think it matters less for that reason, but in some primal way, the opposite is true. It is professional cricket's equivalent of a backyard game against your siblings, where it seems nothing quite matters more than the result. Despite the unusual circumstances of a recycled pitch, a weakened Pakistan, and an empty stadium, this is the game boiled down to its most basic form, where two sets of 11 people just want to win for no reason other than it's better than losing it.
When Salman Agha steps out, both of those outcomes appear equally plausible, in no small part to his value all series, and indeed ever since he made his debut. No batter has scored more runs than him at No. 7 or 8 this WTC cycle, and only Harry Brook's triple hundred keeps him off the top spot in the run-scoring charts this series.
But having the most prolific lower-order batter in the world is a bit like being mayor of a city with the highest number of successful drug busts; they may outwardly appear markers of success, but hint at deeper underlying problems. Salman's runs, after all, are at least in part down to few other sides having to deal with a top order that folds with quite as much alacrity as Pakistan's has of late. There may be a time to talk about those problems, but when an election approaches, you push that statistic out, eyes only on the result.
And Pakistan are in campaign season, so it's little surprise Salman gets so much airtime. Perhaps it's because everyone seems to have spent far too much time in Multan, but everything seems to blend into one. The heat is always oppressive; the sun always bakes down. The crowds are always sparse, albeit gradually building up towards the end of the day. And Salman Ali Agha is always trying to add bonus runs with the top order having clocked off work early. On Thursday, Pakistan offered further proof they're no closer to solving that problem, and he was wheeled out one more time as their get-out-of-jail-free card.
The value of the 37-run stand Pakistan have put on for the fifth wicket belied its scratchiness, and when Brydon Carse got Mohammad Rizwan to nick off to the slips, this game was on a knife-edge. It was also the most threatening a pace bowler had looked all game, and Salman, who doesn't always start confidently, looked vulnerable.
That was demonstrated in the 34th over, from Carse, that was as probing as it was unfortunate. A fourth-stump line drew the faintest edge, but it dipped ever so slightly and Jamie Smith fumbled the chance. Two balls later, Salman prodded at another one. This time, it was Joe Root at first slip who spilled it as Carse let out an anguished roar that indicated how much this moment, and this game, mattered.
Pakistan's lower order is like the cocky schoolkid without the muscle to back him up: there to be picked off. The reason it hasn't is, in large part, down to Salman. Pakistan have made a recent habit of scoring these back-end runs. In the previous Test, the last five wickets added 142 and 140. In the first innings here, it was 104; in all three innings, there was at least one significant partnership Salman had been a part of.
Salman said in post-match duties that he initially wanted to bat up the order, but doesn't necessarily feel as strongly about it anymore. There is a peculiar kind of psychological warfare to a lower-order contribution. Runs given away to top order can be tolerated as part of a broader plan, a bowling set up or impending change in the field. Lower down, the opposition almost question a batter's right to be there, an impediment to moving the game on. Every run becomes an irritation, each boundary a gut punch.
Carse was seen off in the heat, and though Jack Leach and Shoaib Bashir chipped away with wickets, Salman found, in Sajid Khan, a man able to stick around, and intensified his attack. Leach was swept when he overpitched, driven over cover when he dragged his length back. There were plenty of those jabs, but also the odd haymaker. He danced down the wicket to clobber a colossal six over long-off to bring up his half-century, and carved Matthew Potts through the covers for four. Pakistan's lead had long raced past 250, and now nudged closer to 300.
"We have scored more than 100 runs [with the lower order] in both innings," Salman said. "That's what we talk about all the time, that if we can add more runs lower down the order, that will be helpful. Those are the kind of runs you sometimes need to score . Because we looked like we'd set about a 230-run target and then that partnership with me and Sajid got us [close to] 300. They are always vital runs."
Since he breathed fresh air into this side, it is increasingly Salman who scores many of these vital runs. He carries himself with the air of a backyard cricketer catapulted into a Test arena, someone for whom the concept that a game of cricket may not really matter all that much is alien. And in a Test that matters simply because it's taking place, that might make all the difference.