Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Sami decimated the Australian batting order with sublime spells of fast bowling that yielded seven first-session wickets. Following Ricky Ponting's contentious decision to bat first on a green-tinged wicket, Sami and Asif took complete control of a rain-delayed opening session to reduce the hosts to 7 for 67 and place them in danger of posting their first
sub-100 total at home since 1984.
Sami, playing his first Test in more than two years following a stint in the unauthorised ICL, scythed through Australia's top order with seven overs of express pace and prodigious movement to account for Phillip Hughes, Ponting and Shane Watson before the first drinks break. Asif then swung into gear in the period leading up to tea with the wickets of Michael Clarke, Michael Hussey, Marcus North and Brad Haddin. Both pacemen found themselves on hat-tricks. Australia were on the ropes.
Sami was an eleventh-hour inclusion in the Pakistani side after the withdrawal of Mohammad Aamer, one of the heroes of Melbourne, with a groin injury. The move almost paid immediate dividends when Sami had Hughes dropped by the hard-handed Umar Akmal at backward point from his first delivery. Retribution followed in the next over, however, when Sami lured Hughes into an aggressive push to a straighter, fuller delivery that flew low to Faisal Iqbal at second slip.
The inspired paceman then removed Ponting with his very next delivery, wafting at a shorter delivery that reared off the surface, and might well have completed a hat-trick had Billy Doctrove ruled Watson out to an excellent lbw appeal that struck him on the front toe. The Pakistanis sent the decision for video review and Hawk-Eye confirmed Sami's 150 km/h bolt had struck him outside the line of off stump. Watson successfully dodged that bullet, but was not so successful in Sami's next over, edging a seaming, straightening delivery to Kamran Akmal.
That left Sami with figures of 3 for 5 from his first four overs, and Australia gasping for breath. Clarke rounded out an eventful hour by successfully overturning Asoka de Silva's decision to adjudge him lbw to an Umar Gul delivery that was comfortably clearing the stumps, but his defiance ended shortly after the drinks break when he was bowled through the gate to an Asif delivery that straightened off the pitch.
The task fell to Hussey and North, both well short of peak form, to pull Australia from the mire. Neither looked comfortable repelling Asif's relentlessly probing lines and it came as little surprise when Hussey fell to a top-edged pull-stroke that was accepted by Misbah-ul-Haq in the slips. North followed next ball, waving at a delivery outside his off-stump, and Asif completed the first session rout by removing an attack-minded Haddin.
Ponting was left to rue the decision to bat first on a green, seaming Sydney Cricket Ground wicket after rain delayed the coin toss until shortly before 2pm. Not since his infamous decision to send England into bat at Edgbaston in 2005 has Ponting
called correctly and opted to bowl. He has now batted first in 23 consecutive Tests after winning the toss.
Earlier, Pakistan named a vastly different attack to that which took the field for the Boxing Day Test last week. Danish Kaneria and Sami replaced Saeed Ajmal and the injured Aamer, while Gul took the place of Abdur Rauf. They faced a new-look Australian opening combination, with Hughes called in at the top of the order to replace Simon Katich, who failed a fitness test on his damaged right elbow on Sunday morning.
