This was almost two series in one. The first part, the opening Test, was played on a dead surface in Multan upon which England broke some astonishing run-scoring records.

Pakistan, beaten in six consecutive Tests and winless in 11 at home, opted for radical change. Out went star batter Babar Azam, and pace bowlers Naseem Shah and Shaheen Shah Afridi.

In came Noman and Sajid. The pitch in Multan was reused, then the surface in Rawalpindi was dried with heaters and fans. Coach Jason Gillespie was effectively sidelined by the tactics, but success has been delivered.

Remarkably, England scored more runs in one innings in the first Test, 823-7 declared, than they did in four innings in the other two Tests put together. It is the first time they have gone 1-0 up then lost a three-Test series.

To merely pin the turnaround on the conditions would be a disservice to Pakistan. England had the benefit of winning the toss in the third Test, then frittered it away.

The tourists’ spinners were no match for the home tweakers, while England’s batters struggled for the right tempo on the Rawalpindi pitch, possibly spooked by all the talk of a raging turner.

On the second afternoon, when Saud Shakeel’s century was leading Pakistan’s recovery from 177-7, England were bafflingly passive with their tactics.

England, who preach stability and togetherness, will not panic or make wholesale changes, not least because the conditions were so alien. After five Test tours of Asia since the start of 2021, they do not return until a visit to Bangladesh in 2027.

Still, questions will travel to New Zealand with them, not least over the form of captain Stokes and vice-captain Ollie Pope.

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LOS ANGELES — Juan Soto walked out of the Yankees clubhouse with a scowl. Aaron Boone walked down the hallway with furrowed eyebrows and a look of irritation he couldn’t hide. Even Aaron Judge, who likes to throw in a small smile at the end of his responses no matter the day or the outcome of a game, struggled to really get there. The mood was set by their exceptional silence. The only sound made was that of the clubhouse attendants smacking cleats against a table to get all the dirt off. 

This one hurt. 

“It’s a seven-game series. You’re going to lose tough ones,” Yankees first baseman Anthony Rizzo said. “We’ve lost tough ones in the past. This is what defines character. Yeah, it stings because of the magnitude. But I wouldn’t say anyone’s more pissed off than any other loss.”

The Yankees said all the right things, like they’d pick their heads up and get back at it on Saturday, but their miffed expressions told a different story after losing 6-3 to the Dodgers in the 10th inning of Game 1 of the World Series. You can’t blame them for being shocked or crestfallen; the stage was set for the Yankees to secure a win on the road right up until Freddie Freeman hit the first walk-off grand slam in World Series history off left-hander Nestor Cortes. 

[RELATED: Full coverage of the World Series]

Despite their defensive blunders and a curious early hook on Gerrit Cole, the Yankees were one out away from a Game 1 victory when Cortes’ second pitch in 37 days — a 92 mph fastball, low and inside, right where Freeman likes to barrel the ball — was pummeled halfway up the right-field pavilion at Dodger Stadium. Cortes’ first pitch got Shohei Ohtani to fly out in foul territory, where left fielder Alex Verdugo tumbled into and over the railing and made a spectacular catch for the second out of the 10th inning. The Yankees never got the chance to celebrate that gutsy play as Mookie Betts was intentionally walked to load the bases and a Freeman-induced nightmare immediately followed. 

“Maybe just two or three inches higher,” Cortes said when asked where he wanted his fastball to Freeman. “I thought I got it to the inside part of the plate where I wanted to, but I didn’t get it up enough.”

Cortes spent the days leading up to Friday’s relief appearance convincing the Yankees that he belonged on the World Series roster. He missed the final week of the regular season, as well as New York’s first two rounds of the postseason, with an elbow flexor strain. There was a clear need for his left-handed arm on the pitching staff, and Cortes badly wanted to help his team win. Boone believed he could with the Dodgers’ two best left-handed hitters due up.

“The reality is, he’s been throwing the ball really well the last few weeks as he’s gotten ready for this,” Boone said of Cortes. “I knew with one out there, it’d be tough to double up Shohei, if Tim Hill gets him on the ground. And then Mookie behind him is a tough matchup there, so, felt convicted with Nestor in that spot.”

While Cortes did more damage than good in Game 1, he should get at least one more chance in the Series to atone for his mistake. After all, he was hardly the only Yankee to slip up. 

Soto overran a Kiké Hernández liner in right field in the fifth inning, turning what should have been a double into a triple. The Dodgers promptly cashed in on Soto’s misplay by hitting a sacrifice fly and scoring Hernández from third for the first run of the game. In the eighth, Ohtani ripped a double with an exit velocity of 113 mph to right that Soto fielded off the wall. He double-pumped before getting the throw in to second, where Gleyber Torres couldn’t handle the scoop as the ball ricocheted off his glove and into no-man’s land near the mound. Ohtani advanced to third — Soto was charged with an error — and Mookie Betts promptly hit a sacrifice fly to tie the game at 2-2. 

Mistakes like that can’t happen at this point in the long season. 

“Every little thing from the game is an opportunity for the offense to get another run,” Torres said. “And yeah, Ohtani went to third and Mookie hit the fly to center and it was a tie game. I have to make an adjustment and if I get an opportunity to block the ball, just keep it in the front and make it a little more simple.”

The Yankees overcame gaffes on defense and Boone’s questionable decision to pull Cole — he had allowed just one run and four hitters to reach safely through six-plus innings and 88 pitches — to reach the bottom of the 10th inning with a 3-2 lead. Playoff hero Giancarlo Stanton slugged his fourth home run in his past four games; this one a two-run shot in the sixth that gave the Yankees a 2-1 lead. Stanton needs one more home run this October to become the first Yankee in franchise history to hit seven homers in a single postseason. 

But Yankees triumphs that would have loomed large in Game 1 are now buried somewhere under the Dodgers’ dogpile at home plate.

“We had our chances there,” said Judge, who went 1 for 5, struck out three times and left two runners on while popping out to end the top of the ninth. “Kind of back and forth the whole game. We had our opportunities to put them away. We just weren’t able to do it. And they came up with a big clutch hit there at the end.”

The Yankees could’ve used more of those. They’ll now give the ball to Carlos Rodón for Game 2 on Saturday — with Yoshinobu Yamamoto on the bump for the Dodgers — hoping the lefty can carry them back to the Bronx with a series split. As Rizzo said, brutal losses can define a team’s character. The Yankees have at least one more day in L.A. to show who they are. 

Deesha Thosar is an MLB reporter for FOX Sports. She previously covered the Mets as a beat reporter for the New York Daily News. The daughter of Indian immigrants, Deesha grew up on Long Island and now lives in Queens. Follow her on Twitter at @DeeshaThosar.

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Rafferty also conceded that it was difficult for her to imagine reaching such a milestone before Tanya Oxtoby was appointed, given that she had been in and out of Northern Ireland squads in the past.

“Football can work in weird and wonderful ways, I’m being given opportunities and I’m taking them, I give everything for my country,” she added.

The 28-year-old praised newly appointed Northern Ireland captain Simone Magill for passing on the captain’s armband as the Birmingham City striker wanted to mark Rafferty’s 50th cap by letting her lead the team out.

“It was probably tricky for her as she has just been announced as captain, but she had a word with me and told me she wanted me to wear it and I’m very grateful.

“She made my day by saying that and the group made it really special, it was a night I won’t forget.”

Rafferty admitted that Northern Ireland had to “dig deep” to grind out a draw courtesy of a late own goal.

“The goal was scrappy, but it was a goal and I’m delighted for Casey Howe to come off the bench and make that happen.”

“We get to go home now, and we want to put in a performance and reach the next round.”

She believes that the pitch was a contributing factor to the scrappy nature of the game.

“First half it wasn’t so bad but second half it was completely churned up, we managed it as much as we could it wasn’t the prettiest, but we got the result.”

Cameron Waters made a statement with a pole-to-flag Saturday win on the streets of the Gold Coast for the second year in succession in Supercars.

After taking a season-high sixth pole position, Waters won the start in his Tickford Racing Ford Mustang and built a lead of over five seconds before his first pitstop. For much of the middle stint he had team-mate Thomas Randle close behind, before he pulled away and went on to win by a convincing 9.41s.

“What a day, what a weekend so far. This thing has been an absolute rocketship all weekend,” he grinned after his fourth race win of the season.

“I got a really good start, I had a pretty cool race car and I just had to make the most of it. The car was bloody good and I don’t think we’ll be doing much to it [overnight].”

Randle drove strongly to make it a Tickford 1-2, and at one stage was right under Waters’s wing, before settling back to ensure his second podium finish of the season.

“What a race! It was pretty crazy down at Turn 1 but I made it through,” said Randle after his team’s first 1-2 result since 2017.

“I was trying not to look in the mirrors, it [the gap to Broc Feeney] was flickering and then going back up. The pitstops were amazing.”

Triple Eight’s Feeney, who started fourth, was aided by a very short first pitstop and who, inevitably, dropped back to eighth after a necessarily longer second stop, but still emerged as the best of the Chevrolet Camaros. He snatched third place off Matt Payne with 10 laps remaining, and then chased Randle before settling for third.

In Fourth place came Matt Payne, who started from the fifth row after he overshot a corner during his shootout lap. The Grove Racing Ford driver consolidated early and once he got into clean air, he was able to set rapid lap times.

Fresh from his Bathurst win, Brodie Kostecki gave Erebus Motorsport fifth place after starting from 10th on the grid after triggering a kerb sensor on his top 10 shootout lap. Sixth was David Reynolds, a deserved reward for the Team18 squad which essentially built a new Chevrolet after Reynolds’s significant Bathurst qualifying crash.

Behind Reynolds in seventh was Triple Eight’s Will Brown. The championship leader started from 11th on the grid after crashing out of the provisional qualifying session and, after swift repairs, understandably drove a circumspect race to take seventh.

Andre Heimgartner (Brad Jones Racing Chevrolet) was eighth ahead of Richie Stanaway, who started from the front row in the Grove Racing Ford and ran in second place in the early laps, before dropping back.

The one driver who may have challenged Waters for the win was Walkinshaw Andretti United’s Chaz Mostert, who battled with a gearshift sensor problem which negated his flat-shift feature. During both his fuel stops it also slowed his Ford nearly to walking pace in the pitlane, costing him around five seconds in his first stop and 20 in his second. His consolation prize was 10th place.

One of the fastest of the Chevrolets and one who might have challenged for a podium was PremiAir Racing Camaro driver James Golding, who snatched third place from Stanaway on lap 11 and chased after the Fords. But a left-rear wheel nut got stuck at his first pitstop, dropping him out of the top 20. By the end of the race he recovered slightly but only to 16th place.

The results mean that Brown, who carried a 204 championship point lead over Feeney into the race, saw his advantage reduced to 171 points, 2634 to 2463. Mostert remains third on 2391 ahead of Waters (2224), Mayne (1779) and Golding (1775).

Sunday’s schedule will see the Supercars back on the 3km street circuit at 10:10am local time for qualifying, for the top 10 shootout at 12:35pm and on the grid for the 22nd race of the season over 85 laps at 3:15pm.