KARACHI, FEBRUARY 1 The moment Pakistan crossed 500 runs on Tuesday, it was obvious they would set India a mammoth total to chase. That was confirmed this morning when the lead stretched to 606. But on a pitch that held no devils and given the strength and depth of India’s batting line-up, it was not too far-fetched to believe they could stick it out.

The two key players in this drama would be Virender Sehwag, for his ability to score the knock-on effect his innings have, and Rahul Dravid for his ability to stay and occupy a crease for hours. Their dismissal inside two overs put Pakistan in sniffing distance of the match and the series.

Dravid’s dismissal raised one question: Did the team’s best batsman, and the world’s best number three, really need to go out and open the innings? The team had other openers — Sourav, Sachin and Irfan have all done the job on occasion — and could have held the skipper back for the No 3 slot which he’s made his own.

‘‘Once we had got Dravid and Sehwag, we knew it was just a matter of time,’’ Pakistan captain Younis Khan said after the match. Even young speedster Mohammed Asif explained how Pakistan had decided that Dravid was going to be the man whom they would target.

So why did he open? Asked this specific question at this evening’s press conference, the captain came up with a pretty lame excuse. ‘‘At that moment (in Lahore), we thought this was the best possible option. It succeeded there and we didn’t find any reason to change it.’’

Once the openers were dismissed, the rest of the batting order followed pretty soon, There wasn’t a single batsman—with the exception of Yuvraj Singh—who appeared ready to take the challenge hands on.

Instead of trying to assess what went wrong, Dravid decided to do some talking for Yuvraj: ‘‘Yuvraj played an outstanding knock. He is the future of Indian cricket. Players like him need to be backed. He showed a lot of determination.’’

Ironically, there are two specialist openers in the squad but Wasim Jaffer and Gautam Gambhir will return to India unaware of just how they have been assessed or how they have contributed to this tour. Or how they will be picked, if at all, in the home Tests against England.

SCOREBOARD  

Pakistan (1st Innings): 245 India (1st Innings): 238 Pakistan (2nd Innings) (Overnight: 511-5) S Butt lbw Ganguly 53 I Farhat c Sachin b Pathan 57 Y Khan lbw Kumble 77 M Yousuf lbw Kumble 97 F Iqbal c Sachin b Zaheer 139 S Afridi c Sachin b RP Singh 60 A Razzaq c Yuvraj b Kumble 90 K Akmal not out 0 Extras (b7, lb7, nb11, w1): 26 Total (for 7 wkts decl, 140.1 overs): 599 Fall of wickets: 1-109, 2-122, 3-280, 4-318, 5-402, 6-598, 7-599 Bowling: I Pathan 25-3-106-1, Zaheer Khan 28-4-103-1, RP Singh 24-1-115-1, A Kumble 37.1-3-151-3, S Ganguly 16-1-68-1, V Sehwag 1-0-2-0, S Tendulkar 9-0-40-0 India (2nd Innings) V Sehwag b Asif 4 R Dravid c Akmal b Akhtar 2 VVS Laxman b Asif 21 S Tendulkar b Asif 26 S Ganguly lbw Razzaq 37 Y Singh c Akmal b Razzaq 122 M Dhoni c Farhat b Razzaq 18 I Pathan c Iqbal b Razzaq 4 A Kumble c Farhat b Kaneria 5 Z Khan b Kaneria 10 R Singh not out 0 Extras (b7, nb4, w5) : 16 Total (all out, 58.4 overs): 265 Fall of wickets: 1-8, 2-8, 3-63, 4-74, 5-177, 6-208, 7-216, 8-231, 9-251 Bowling: S Akhtar 8-1-37-1, M Asif 12-1-48-3, A Razzaq 18.4-0-88-4, D Kaneria 18-0-75-2, S Afridi 2-0-10-0 Result: Pakistan win by 341 runs