Johannesburg — Dean Elgar acknowledged that when he arrived at Lord’s on Friday he was thinking about his lower order building on the team’s lead and then the prospect of some long hours in the field. It didn’t turn out that way at all.
Play on the third day lasted just under five hours, the match itself, a little more than two days — taking into account all the time lost to rain on the first day — and the accelerated nature of the outcome was stunning.
South Africa knew they had a very good attack, all that chatter beforehand about looking forward to seeing England try their attacking approach against ‘our bowlers’ wasn’t macho talk.
The Proteas have a very serious group of fast bowlers; Kagiso Rabada claimed a first innings five-for and on Friday the quickest of the lot, Anrich Nortje, produced an explosive spell that blew the English away in 40 minutes. The Sky Sports commentators want to give them a nickname — ‘Fab Four,’ ‘Awesome Foursome’. Call them what you like, you don’t want to be facing them.
Oh, and the left-arm spinner isn’t bad either.
South Africa started the day with a 124-run lead, with England still feeling they were very much in the game. The lower order added 37 runs, with Nortje finishing not out on 28, but with so much time left to play — on Friday — and then the weekend, and the pitch apparently settling down, everyone was keen to see how England’s new style would allow them to set up a game in order to win it.
While Lungi Ngidi and Rabada bowled two high quality new ball spells in which one chance was created and missed by Keegan Petersen at third slip, the breakthrough came from another source.
Keshav Maharaj started bowling in the eighth over, a seemingly bizarre decision given the fast bowling resources at Elgar’s disposal. But as has been the case from the time he won the toss on Wednesday morning, the Proteas captain made the right call again.
The horribly out of sorts Zak Crawley foolishly swept hard and was trapped lbw by Maharaj’s third ball and then with his 18th delivery, the left-arm spinner found the same mode of dismissal to get rid of Ollie Pope, who played around one that replays showed would have crashed into his leg stump.
Two down at lunch and none to the quickies, England for all their outward coolness must have been shocked.
The big fish, Joe Root, was reeled in by Ngidi, who bowled magnificently on Friday. He had the ball on a string, moving it one way then another, beating both edges and doing so at pace. He drew Root into a jab outside off-stump with a lovely delivery that just held its line, with Aiden Markram taking a good low catch at second slip.
It would have been understandable had Elgar kept Ngidi going, but he chucked the ball to Nortje and then the fun really started.
Jonny Bairstow had been tempted by a few balls outside his off-stump — getting one away through the covers for four, but mostly wafting as they went past his outside edge at 145km/h-plus. Eventually he touched one, Kyle Verreynne took the catch, and Nortje popped some blood vessels as he celebrated. His best delivery came in his next over – from around the wicket he got one to straighten off the surface to the left-handed Alex Lees, who if he hadn’t edged it would have been bowled.
Ben Foakes didn’t want to know and faced just two balls before edging behind to Verreynne and in the space of nine deliveries, South Africa’s chances of winning went from very good to inevitable.
Rabada returned to pick up Ben Stokes and Stuart Broad, while Marco Jansen, who’d earlier just missed out on a maiden Test half-century, took the last two wickets to set off some understandably animated celebrations.
All the talk beforehand was about England’s approach and afterwards their captain Stokes said they wouldn’t read too much into the result of the match. Head coach Brendon McCullum, praised for liberating the England change-room, said people should “buckle up for the ride”.
Well the ride went one way only in the first Test and on Friday it was pretty darn fast and England couldn’t keep up.
South Africa were sublime with the ball, with Rabada taking seven wickets, Nortje six and Jansen four. While Ngidi only took one, that one, broke the back of England’s second innings.
The batting was composed and methodical, highlighted by Sarel Erwee, while there was plenty of flair in how Maharaj and Jansen played in their glorious assault on the second evening.
This was very much a Test win to savour for the Proteas, and Elgar is free to go and think about some other things for the rest of the weekend.
IOL Sport