There is a common trope in football, of a manager being appointed mid-season by a struggling side, then deciding to delay taking full charge of the upcoming game.
Some tend to prefer to see how the team operates from the stands before getting involved… especially if their first fixture is against one of the stronger teams in the league. Why start with a midweek thrashing, away to the defending champions, when you could get an easier first hit out at home on the weekend?
A penny, then, for Stephen Fleming's thoughts, who finds himself in a contorted version of this situation.
The incoming Test head coach opted to delay his arrival into the post, to spend time with his family as well as to decompress after a long CSK stint.
He will only get to the UK in September, and his first assignment this winter is three Tests against South Africa, the reigning World Test Champions. The New Zealander had been keeping tabs on this match, and has been speaking to Joe Root pretty much every day since accepting the role, but he must surely be wondering if he has spurned a shot at an easy three points to kick-start his tenure.
Fleming would not have needed to know anything of the form of his players, nor the backstory to how this collection of cricketers have found themselves where they are. As beleaguered as this England Test side is, they simply needed to be pointed in the right direction in order to thump Pakistan by an innings and 103 runs across effectively two days' worth of play.
For Root, this was the softest landing he could have hoped for, upon returning to the Test captaincy full-time. If his first five-year stint between 2017 and 2022 developed into an unhealthy relationship, these three days were a holiday fling. And he will know this is not how cushty things will be long-term.
For what it's worth, Root's record in charge is now back into the black, 27 wins to 26 defeats across 66 matches, after reverting to unwelcome parity when he stood in for Ben Stokes for the second Test against New Zealand, and emerged with an innings defeat.
At 1,053 balls, it slots in as Root's joint-second quickest win, level with the defeat of Ireland at Lord's in 2019 and 30 deliveries slower than a Chris Woakes-inspired shellacking of India, also at Lord's in 2018.
The "one win in 17" record that has been used to dent his leadership aptitude has not exactly lost its weight. You wouldn't write songs about "two wins in 19". As it happens, both of the victories in that period have come at Headingley - home comforts reinforced by plenty of the Root clan at the ground to take in this second coming.
Throughout this Test, there were hints of the change that Root hopes to have undergone as a leader. Small things did seem to make a difference, even if Pakistan's ineptitude gave them greater weight.
There was Root's decision to station himself at mid-off and -on, to allow more fluid conversations with his bowlers. His first go at the captaincy had involved outsourcing brainstorming to James Anderson and Stuart Broad. Now, he has to bring it back in-house.
"It was good until I ripped my trouser and my knee open," Root said, having had to fling himself around the field more dramatically after departing the slip cordon. Even so, he was back in at first slip on Friday when Ben Duckett left the field at the start of the 30th over of Pakistan's second innings.
"I think sometimes you can find yourself quite distant from things at slip. But, to be on the same page and understand what they're thinking, and to have [the bowlers] understand how I'm seeing the game as well.
"I haven't got the experience I had first time round," he said of the bowlers at his disposal. "It was quite easy on occasions to leave Jimmy and Broady to it there. Very experienced, knew what they were, how they were going to operate."
This time, it helped that Root had strapping seamers who know their games, even though they had never before operated together as a foursome. That lack of self-knowledge had a glaring issue during the Ashes, even under a captain as pro-active as Stokes.
But, with Stokes' four-year tenure providing a template for how to handle the inexperience of the attack, Root stepped up. And, given that three of his four quicks were capable of taking the new ball, there was even scope for him to indulge in some uncharacteristic tough love.
Jofra Archer opened the match with two maidens from the Football Stand End, but he was wayward than his figures suggested. Root unceremoniously removed him for Gus Atkinson. The upshot was a more fired-up, relentless Archer, as Imam-ul-Haq discovered second-time around. His fifth ball of the second innings was an inducking bumper that he couldn't help but glove through to Jamie Smith.
Archer's second wicket was the product of some tactical flexing. Three deliveries earlier, Root decided to put himself in at leg slip, as Stokes had often done in his time. A narrow flick off the pads from Azan Awais brought it all together.
"It doesn't always work like that," Root said, knowingly, before throwing the praise back on his bowlers. "There's a number of different things you're always trying to work towards. But when you're bowlers are skillful enough to deliver on it, that's the most rewarding thing."
Ahead of this match, there had been a good deal for Root to manage, including his own appointment. He made sure to touch base with various members of the squad during the Hundred, amid his own campaign with Welsh Fire. Regular conversations with Fleming and interim coach Marcus Trescothick centred around his approach to the role, but Root had a clear vision on what he wanted to take forward from the previous era, and areas he sought to fix. That included kiboshing the curfew.
Styles of play, strength and other facets of England's game have blurred in the recent past, and those will take a little longer to clear up. The team will certainly need to play more competitive, longer games of cricket before they become apparent. And what fears there were around Root's re-assumption of the captaincy have not been quelled simply because they have thrashed a Pakistan side so poor that stand-in captain, Salman Agha, joked that he could not wait to step aside for Babar Azam's return.
Nor is this a corner turned for England. Not yet. It's worth noting this third victory in 10 Tests - with seven defeats - was another brief affair. Bad pitches at the MCG and Lord's played as much of a part in their previous victories over Australia (a 142-over game) and New Zealand (166) as a bad Pakistan (175.3 overs) on a fine Headingley pitch.
"To start like this is excellent, but it's almost like… what does it look like when we get down to Lord's?" Root wondered, hinting at the team's recent inability to bank consistent wins, which is why they have not secured a series since December 2024. "How can we continue a lot of the good stuff that we've done here?
"It's not getting too carried away. What a brilliant performance it was. With the Hundred, coming into a completely different format and having the right attitude. taking the confidence from it, having success. It's been great in so many different ways. And it's like - can we now carry that on again?"
Root will not be alone in staying level. The early finish allows a five-day lead-in to the second Test. It should be enough time to savour a good start and move on. The quality of the cricket on show warrants nothing more.