Finally, a way to stop Joe Root, or probably not, as he embodies the spirit of new England

The question has exercised the minds of captains and bowlers since the Yorkshireman came on the international scene.

Do you handicap him so that he arrives at the crease in arrears?

Should he start his innings on minus-50, say, so that he needs a half-century before he then gets to score?

Or should he be blindfolded before he takes guard, permitted to use only sound and instinct to steer bat on to ball?

Certainly conventional methods are often unsuccessful, the only wonder being that he is ever dismissed.

On the fourth day in Rawalpindi, though, which Pakistan closed on 80-2 needing a further 263 to win a game that could go either way, Root unwittingly showed how he could in fact be stopped - or at least halted to some extent.

All it needs is for the International Cricket Council to announce that he must henceforth be made to bat left-handed, his cheeky change of stance to a ball from leg-spinner Zahid Mahmood almost bringing his downfall with his score at 52.

It happened like this…

Mahmood, the 35-year-old debutant, whose 33 overs in the first innings produced the very modern analysis of 4-235, had been bowling round the wicket into a patch of rough outside the leg stump.

England were charging towards a declaration and Pakistan were trying to dry up the runs.

Root, as if reading from the cricketing commandments in the Book of Bazball, simply took guard left-handed like his brother, Billy, and swept Mahmood to midwicket, where Naseem Shah spilled a diving opportunity that he really should have grabbed.

Root trotted through for a single and then reproached himself before rehearsing the shot, as if to say that he should have kept the ball down or sent it well past the fielder.

Determining that discretion is the better part of valour, the 31-year-old reverted to type and continued on his way right-handed, going on to 73 before a conventional sweep off the same bowler flew to Iman-ul-Haq at short backward-square.

“That is remarkable what I’ve just seen,” purred Nasser Hussain, the former England captain on television commentary, following Root’s ambidextrous interlude.

“Batting right-handed is too easy for him!”

It was as if Root had metamorphosed into Ronnie O’Sullivan, the snooker genius who can cue with either hand.

As with O’Sullivan, Root could probably carve out a career playing left-handed were he so minded; there was certainly nothing wrong aesthetically with the left-handed sweep, only the slight miscalculation of the accompanying top-edge.

Root is not afraid to try different things and sometimes flips his stance to switch-hit the bowlers.

No, the only thing for it is for the ICC to declare, at their next meeting, that the former captain must be hampered in some way to give the opposition a chance - although the governing body is probably daft enough to do it, so it’s perhaps best not to give it any ideas.

Another man who might have to be handicapped in some way in the interests of fairness is Root’s Yorkshire team-mate Harry Brook.

Although just two games into his Test career, Brook looks as though he has played as many as Root, who is in the throes of his 125th appearance.

There seems to be no fearlessness whatsoever in the 23-year-old’s make-up.

After managing only 12 on Test debut last summer against South Africa at the Oval, followed by some underwhelming returns at the T20 World Cup, Brook has radiated in Rawalpindi and shown the form so familiar to Yorkshire’s supporters.

He hit 153 in the first innings and 87 in the second.

It’s clearly early days, but it would already be a surprise if Brook doesn’t join Root in the ranks of those who make over 100 Test appearances.

By rights, Brook should expect to receive a Christmas card shortly from the family of Gilbert Jessop, whose name he has done much to keep in the spotlight in recent days.

After falling just five balls short in the first innings of beating Jessop’s record for the fastest Test hundred for England, a 76-ball effort against Australia at the Oval in 1902 (the sports editor remembers it well), Brook needed only 13 more from 11 balls to beat it on Sunday when he was bowled by Naseem in pursuit of quick runs.

Jessop must be sitting a little uncomfortably in the viewing gallery in the great pavilion in the sky, mindful that it may only be a matter of time before Brook or one of the Bazball set breaks a record that has lasted for 120 years. Will it even out-last the tour, in fact?

It is a tribute to Brook, Root and above all Ben Stokes that all results were possible going into day five.

Anyone can talk the talk, prattling on about positive cricket and looking to take the game to the opposition. It is another thing to put that into practice as Stokes’s England are doing, both at home last summer and now during this series.

There are times when it won’t always work, not least when Stokes fell to his third ball on Sunday, scuffing a simple catch to short cover as opposed to playing himself in.

But with precocious talents like Brook on board, and old hands like Root who can even play left-handed, England are exploring the limits of the possible.