Shan Masood’s broken finger costs him the second Test and clouds the England tour
Pakistan’s opener fractured his left index finger while making 109 in Tarouba, then batted at No. 8 with it. The PCB will not yet say whether he makes Headingley on 19 August.
Jul 31, 2026
Shan Masood will miss Pakistan’s second Test against West Indies after fracturing the index finger on his left hand, and the bigger worry for the PCB is what happens after that. The first Test of Pakistan’s tour of England starts at Headingley on 19 August, and the board has stopped short of saying he will be fit for it.
The damage was done on day three of the opening Test at the Brian Lara Cricket Academy in Tarouba, and Masood did it in the middle of the innings that defined the match. He batted on to 109, the only century either side managed. Then he came back out at No. 8 in the second innings with the finger already broken.
What the PCB actually said
The board’s statement was careful rather than reassuring. “Following a scan and clinical assessment, Shan is currently undergoing treatment from the Pakistan team medical panel,” it read. “His availability for the first Test against England starting August 19 at Leeds will depend on his recovery and clinical progress. In the meanwhile, he will remain with the team.”
Keeping him in the Caribbean rather than flying him home is the interesting part. It suggests the medical panel wants him where they can watch the finger day by day, and it suggests nobody has written off Headingley yet. Finger fractures are unpredictable in exactly this way. Some batters are gripping a bat inside three weeks. Others find the hand will not close properly for two months.
Pakistan were already short
This is not the first hole in the touring party, and the previous one has the same shape. Abdullah Fazal, a left-handed opener, hurt his lower back in a training session at the Brian Lara Cricket Academy before the series even started and was ruled out of both the West Indies Tests and the England tour. Abdullah Shafique came in as his replacement for the second Test and the three Tests in England.
So Pakistan have now lost one opener for the whole of the next two months and may have lost another. The second Test starts on Sunday 2 August at Queen’s Park Oval in Port of Spain, and they go into it 1-0 down in a two-match series they can no longer win. West Indies took the opener by 90 runs, bowling Pakistan out for 120 chasing 211, an eighth away Test defeat in a row.
Why the England question matters more
Missing one Test in Trinidad is a nuisance. Missing three in England would be a different order of problem, and not only because of the World Test Championship points on offer at Headingley.
English conditions are where Masood’s record is strongest. His highest Test score, 156, came against England at Old Trafford in 2020. He made 1,520 runs at 48 across 18 matches for Yorkshire between 2015 and 2020, and in a short spell at Derbyshire in 2022 he became the first Pakistani batter to score consecutive County Championship double hundreds. Pakistan have plenty of players who will find August in Leeds unfamiliar. He is not one of them.
England will have their own new arrangement to bed in by then. Joe Root has just been reappointed as their Test captain, with Marcus Trescothick taking the series as interim head coach before Stephen Fleming arrives in December. A Pakistan side missing Masood walking into that is a slightly different contest than one with him at the top.
Three weeks is the number that matters now. If the finger knits cleanly, he plays at Leeds. If it does not, Pakistan open a Test series in England with a top order they have not picked yet.