New Year’s Test: David Warner poised for chance to win third match against Pakistan in final Test

David Warner will have one final chance to win a Test match in a neat end to the farewell he scripted and the most prolific career ever by an Australian opener. On likely the final day of his final Test, Warner will bat to secure a clean sweep, with Pakistan finishing the third day in Sydney 82 runs clear but with just three wickets in hand. Josh Hazlewood took a triple-wicket maiden to charge through Pakistan’s middle-order late in the day and leave them 7-68 at stumps. Pakistan took a shock first-innings lead when they rattled through Australia’s tail, leaving them 299 all-out and 12 runs in arrears thanks to six wickets from Aamir Jamal and a collapse of 5-10. A new ball blitz in the final session thrust Australia back into the ascendency. Pakistan were left at 2-1 after another searing spell from Mitchell Starc and Hazlewood. Abdullah Shafique had Starc swing a ball wildly back through his gate and rattle his stumps, but Shan Masood fell in a moment of madness where he chased a Hazlewood ball from well outside off and well away from his body. The loss of the captain was a huge blow to their hopes of constructing a defendable lead, leaving debutant Saim Ayub to weather Australia’s new-ball storm. Starc’s ball to Shafique was full, fast and far too good for the opener, whose hot form has come crashing down with a pair in Sydney and his two horror dropped catches. The promise around Ayub was that he would improve the strike rate of the dumped Imam-ul-Haq. He did his best to live up to it, unfurling into a lofted six over point against Starc and the swinging ball. He then stood tall and pulled Pat Cummins ball to the boundary at cow-corner. Nathan Lyon was injected after just nine overs on a wicket that had ragged for Salman Ali Agha and Sajid Khan earlier in the day. He came close to taking the wicket of Babar Azam for 20, but Australia burnt a review when a shrieking Marnus Labuschagne talked Cummins into a review. Ayub’s encouraging knock was closed on 33 from 53 balls when Lyon struck him on the pads; the 21-year-old opener ending his Test debut by taking a review with him. It was enough for Travis Head to be called on with the ball, the part-timer needing just 14 balls to take the prized wicket of Babar with an off-spinner that took the outside-edge. Hazlewood launched a six ball blitz and left his stamp on the series by luring Saud Shakeel into chasing a wide one, bowling nightwatchman Sajid and finding Salman’s outside-edge in the penultimate over of the day. Pakistan’s first-innings lead came after batting hero Aamir Jamal ended Marsh’s resistance and then clattered through Australia’s tail with the ball. The hosts would have been building a lead if it wasn’t for Jamal’s record stand with the bat. Then when it looked like they would anyway, he stopped them in their tracks. The break-out star, who only debuted last month in Perth but has fast become Pakistan’s main weapon with the ball, took six wickets, including four in a collapse of 5-10 across less than four overs. “I’m over the moon now,” Jamal told Fox Cricket after Australia’s innings ended. “I’m feeling proud to be representing my country at such a level and performing for them. This is a wonderful achievement for me.” “I just back myself every time. If I’ve been conceding runs I still back (myself) because when you try to get some wickets you get boundaries as well.” Earlier, Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne had added 79 for the third wicket before falling in consecutive overs before lunch. Smith was the first to go for 38. Set up with an umbrella offside field that included three catching men in the short-cover region, Smith walked down the wicket at a ball from Hamza. The ball took a puff of dust on the way through, slowing up off the surface, before Smith only succeeded in cover-driving it to Babar Azam. Labuschagne followed six balls later for 60. Looking in his best touch of the summer, the right-hander was bowled between bat and pad by a ball that spun back out of the footmarks from Salman Agha. At that moment, Pakistan looked a chance of achieving a first-innings advantage, and the proposition of chasing last on this SCG wicket was appearing difficult. Head was also trapped lbw by Jamal for 10 after lunch, given out and being ordered to go on umpire’s call after reviewing. Jamal finished with figures of 6-69, his second six-wicket haul of the tour. His 18 wickets are the most for any rookie Pakistan bowler in a three-Test series. Only minutes after tea, Jamal dismissed Australia’s last recognised batter Mitch Marsh, who chipped the ball straight to mid-off, where he was caught by Shan Masood. Marsh, Australia’s form batter this series, had looked in ominous touch on his way to a gritty half-century. But the allrounder so badly mistimed a shot on 54 that he began to walk from the crease almost immediately after the ball left his bat. Jamal mopped up Australia’s tail, first dismissing Pat Cummins lbw for a second-ball duck and then seeing off Nathan Lyon for five and Josh Hazlewood for a duck in the space of three deliveries.