Andrew Strauss heaped praise on England's victorious opponents, after Pakistan sealed the three-Test series in Abu Dhabi on Saturday.
England crumbled in their second innings on day four to be all out for 72 - their worst effort against Pakistan in Test history - after requiring just 145 for victory.
Captain Strauss scored 32 of those runs, but chief destroyers Abdur Rehman (6-25) and Saeed Ajmal (3-22) ensured Pakistan took an unassailable 2-0 lead heading into the third Test in Dubai.
And Strauss paid due credit to the spinning pair, who bamboozled England into giving up 10 wickets for just 51 runs after a 21-run opening stand.
"I wish I could explain it. Ultimately it was about very good bowling from both ends, applying pressure, making it hard for us to score and maybe we didn't take as many good options as we should have done," Strauss said.
"We'll have some regrets about that, but it was an outstanding game of cricket. We came up short, but ultimately you've got to congratulate Pakistan. They were outstanding."
Amid the gloom of the embarrassing loss, Strauss did find positives in the performance of Stuart Broad, Alastair Cook and Monty Panesar, who was playing his first Test since June 2009.
Panesar took seven wickets for the match, including a haul of 6-62 in the second inning, in a sign he could challenge England's number one tweaker Graeme Swann (five wickets) for his spot in the side.
"There were some outstanding performances on our side - Monty in particular coming back into the side, Stuart Broad, Alastair Cook - we worked hard to get into a position to win the game but ultimately we couldn't take that opportunity," Strauss said.
"We've been rolled over three times out of four (and) the top order have to take that on the chin and make sure that doesn't happen again."
Pakistan captain Misbah-ul-Haq was relieved to secure the win, feeling his side may have been up against it when England were 21-0.
"That was a much-needed victory for us. That's why we're so happy. It was a wonderful team effort, everyone performed, everyone put 100 percent effort in," Misbah said.