West Indies are one result from their first series win over Pakistan since 2000

West Indies have not won a Test series against Pakistan since 2000. They will start the second Test at the Queen’s Park Oval on 2 August, 7.30pm IST, needing only to avoid defeat to end that. It is not the sort of sentence anyone would have written about West Indies Test cricket a couple of years ago, and it says as much about the state of Pakistan’s red-ball team as it does about the hosts.

Pakistan’s away problem is now a record

The 90-run defeat in Tarouba was Pakistan’s eighth consecutive loss away from home, the longest such run in their history. It stretches back to the tour of Australia in December 2023, where they were beaten 3-0, and takes in South Africa and a two-Test trip to Bangladesh in May 2026 that ended in defeats by 104 runs in Dhaka and 78 in Sylhet. Three years have passed since Pakistan last won a Test outside Pakistan.

The first Test showed why in miniature. Pakistan were 67 behind West Indies’ first-innings total with seven wickets still standing, which is the position from which a confident side builds a lead. They lost their next 16 wickets for 109 runs. Chasing 211, they were bowled out for 120, with Jayden Seales taking 5 for 20.

Masood out, Shafique in

Shan Masood has been ruled out with a fractured finger and Abdullah Shafique comes in for him at the top of the order. Shafique’s international career has been drifting since the end of 2022, with a modest run of scores since. He does still produce, having made a century in Multan against England in 2024 and a half-century in Rawalpindi against South Africa, and there is now a top-order place going spare for whoever wants it.

Babar Azam captains, having been reappointed in July. Pakistan’s other problem is the shape of the middle order. Aamer Jamal batted at No. 7 in the first innings in Tarouba and at No. 6 in the second once Masood was hurt, which is too high for him. Saud Shakeel’s addition to the squad pushes Jamal back towards No. 8, but that means picking a batter in place of a bowler, and the bowling was the part that worked. Ali Usman had a quiet debut, Sajid Khan is waiting, and there is the option of handing the quick Ubaid Shah a first cap.

West Indies have found something

The hosts are in a better place than they have been for a while. It has been a good while since they last strung together that kind of consistency, and they arrive off a home series win over Sri Lanka. Their batting remains the weak link, but against a Pakistan attack with no real pace they have been able to win the bowling exchange, and Roston Chase’s side are unlikely to change much.

Tagenarine Chanderpaul made 21 and 35 in the first Test, which reads like nothing until you notice he faced 178 balls doing it, within 21 of the most any batter faced in the match. He saw off the new ball on the first morning and dug in when West Indies were 43 for 4 in the third innings. In a series where the ball has been on top, that kind of occupation has been worth more than strokeplay.

Conditions and what is riding on it

Queen’s Park Oval is the traditional Test ground in Trinidad, and spin is expected to have more of a say here than it did at the Brian Lara Cricket Academy. It is the middle of the wet season, though an unusually dry spell is forecast, so there should be little or no lost time. World Test Championship points are on the table for both.

There is a decent slice of history attached too. If West Indies avoid defeat they will have won back-to-back Test series, something they have not managed against opposition other than Zimbabwe or Bangladesh since 1997, when they beat India and Sri Lanka in succession. Pakistan, for their part, have won eight Tests in the Caribbean, and their two biggest wins both came at this ground: by an innings and one run in 1958, and by 266 runs in 1977. Neither is much use to them now.

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