First Test, day four: England 303 and 326; South Africa 214 and 136-4
A couple of months ago when Steven Finn caught a flight home from the UAE, his left foot in a surgical boot protecting the stress fracture he had sustained in practice, it seemed unlikely that he would even make the South Africa tour. The selectors omitted his name when the touring party was announced but such has been his speedy recovery since that not only was he able to join the team for the second warm-up match, but he is now well on the way to winning the first Test for England.
When Finn had the obdurate, determinedly strokeless Faff du Plessis taken for a 66-ball nine by Alastair Cook at first slip midway through the final over of the fourth day, it gave him a third wicket in the innings and his fifth of the last six that England have taken in the match. A key component of the future of this England team is back close to his best.
The wicket left South Africa, chasing a target of 416 – a theoretical possibility in the 140 overs that were left in the game but unlikely given the deteriorating state of the pitch, the fragility of their batting, and history which says that such a total has only been exceeded once to win a match – at 136 for four, still needing a further 280 runs. The two openers Dean Elgar and Stiaan van Zyl made 40 and 33 respectively in a helter-skelter 53-run opening stand inside 11 overs, as England, straining too hard perhaps, haemorrhaged boundaries at an alarmingly philanthropic rate. AB de Villiers will resume his innings on 37, having been missed behind the wicket by Jonny Bairstow, a stumping chance from the bowling of Moeen Ali, when 33.
It was past five o’clock on a gloomy evening when De Villiers, untroubled to that point, decided to advance down the pitch to the first ball of a new over from Moeen. Habitually he comes down the pitch late and quickly, with no obvious tell-tale trigger movement to alert the bowler into dragging his delivery wider or shorter, speed it up or slow it down. He had already ventured down once before to the off-spinner and drilled the ball just to the on-side of straight.
Now though, with the batsman a yard out of his crease, the ball gripped, turned sharply inside De Villiers’ bat and bounced. The ball all but bowled him as indeed a similar delivery had dismissed Du Plessis in the first innings, a bail feathered to the ground: this time it missed and Bairstow, not in the same postcode, and flinging out a despairing left glove, barely got a touch. The keeper beat the ground in frustration, knowing that it is such crucial moments that can define a keeper’s contribution: it was a tricky chance but of a kind that needs taking.
If this was a big moment in the day for England, who were pressing hard for the one dismissal that would have made a South African victory beyond their capability then, at the last moment, Finn opened the door.The old ball was reversing for the seamers and turning for the spinner, but De Villiers and Du Plessis were hanging in. Finn had already removed Hashim Amla and Elgar, after Ben Stokes, hobbling a little, had bowled Van Zyl. Finn is bowling with great rhythm though, and hitting the bat with jarring regularity. The third ball of what proved the final over bounced, left Du Plessis and flew to Cook who held on triumphantly. With another new ball due in 33 overs, surely only the weather can save South Africa.
When play resumed, England still had work to do with the bat. With a lead of 261 and seven wickets in hand, they certainly held the upper hand, but a new ball would be due in an hour:this was no time to take anything for granted. It was though a busy start to the day that Root and Taylor made, adding 20 in four overs before Kyle Abbott had Root caught at the wicket, playing an indifferent dab outside off stump. He had made 73 as easy as you like, and had the cat that invaded the field on the third day still been in the vicinity would have kicked it: he was incandescent.
An opportunity for Stokes to flay a struggling attack had presented itself. Stokes is an unselfish cricketer but his attempted reverse sweep was a disaster, the ball from Dane Piedt sticking in the pitch a little, and looping gently to slip. Then, in the final over before the new ball would have been due, Taylor, on 42 and advancing busily down the pitch to Piedt, was beaten in the flight, the ball going past his outside edge, with De Villiers completing the stumping. Piedt was to finish with five for 153.
This was precisely the situation in which England did not want to find themselves, even with the lead beyond 300 now, and the pitch showing no signs of getting anything other than trickier as the match entered its final stages. By now though Bairstow was into his stride and Amla chose not to take the new ball. This is a watershed time in his career, for there remains the perception that while he is not sufficiently accomplished technically to bat in the top five as a Test player, he is also just hanging on to the wicketkeeping spot as a temporary measure until Jos Buttler gets some confidence back into his game.
This is unfair on Bairstow, who made selfless runs in the first innings, and now did so again with an innings that ought to have taken the match beyond the reach of the South Africans – 79 runs, scored from only 76 balls was the knock England needed, and there were nine fours and three sixes, each clumped over the legside and onto the grassy spectator banks, before he was last out, taken at long off.
(Guardian service)
