Great Britain produced a spirited fightback from 2-0 down in the last 12 minutes to beat Pakistan 3-2 in the third game of the tri-nations tournament as their own penalty corner specialist Ben Hawes outshone the world’s best Sohail Abbas.
In conditions more suited to Karachi than Cannock, the hosts battled gamely in the first half but still found themselves two penalty corners behind at the interval.
GB knew the threat posed by Abbas, the world’s best exponent of the drag flick, and to that effect detailed goalkeeper Jimi Lewis to charge down the set-pieces.
The former Cannock favourite did that successfully on two occasions but as a result he left space behind him and his back-up failed so when the ball dropped back into the circle Abbas (16 minutes) and Kashif Jawad (35) scored into an unguarded net.
As they had done in the 4-1 defeat to Australia on Saturday, GB came out after the break a better side but despite enjoying more possession it appeared they would go home empty-handed.
However, with 12 minutes remaining a Mark Pearn free-hit from the right was deflected in from close range at the far post by Guy Fordham to give GB the lift they needed.
From then it was virtually one-way traffic as the hosts rediscovered their belief and they could have pulled level seconds later when Jon Peckett’s reverse-stick effort was deflected wide.
With 10 minutes remaining Danny Hall was brought down by Tariq Aziz inside the 25 and the resulting penalty corner was flung low to Salman Akbar’s left by Hawes to level the scores.
Three minutes from time a Pakistan foot in the circle brought another GB corner and this time Hawes, who has been receiving tuition from former GB set-piece specialist Calum Giles, went the other side to snatch what had seemed an unlikely victory midway through the second half.
The result has drawn GB level with Pakistan and Australia on three points after the first round of matches and the action now moves to Beeston in Nottingham where Britain take on the Kookaburras on Wednesday evening.
Coach Jason Lee was pleased to have put three points on the board but he was not getting carried away with the victory.
“I was happy with the way they played in the first half and I thought the score did not reflect that,” he said.
"We carried those things into the second half and we started to set the tone and fatigue finally started to get to them (Pakistan) and they couldn’t cover the space any more.
"The result is good for the guys because they do need to know that what they are doing can actually get the results.
“But they can’t think we are a team that is better than Pakistan. England and Great Britain have always had one-off results against good sides but to be a better side we have to put five or six results together.”