The first Test is moving at a breakneck pace and in all probability in South Africa’s direction. On another steamy day 15 wickets fell, most of them English and the equation looks dire for the tourists.
They were bowled out for 181 inside 54 overs, 103 runs behind South Africa’s first innings score. England have prevailed after a bigger deficit than this earlier this year somewhere up north. But a repetition is unlikely, not just because Jack Leach is absent. The ball is misbehaving more in Pretoria than it did at Leeds in August and at the close of play, despite some wobbles South Africa were leading by 175 with six wickets in hand.
In mid-afternoon some optimism was justifiable. England were 142 for three with Joe Denly and Ben Stokes at the helm, whereupon they contrived to lose seven wickets for 39 runs inside 16 overs, an ugly procession that compelled their weary bowlers to return to the middle about 24 hours earlier than they hoped. Four South Africa wickets were then snatched in a frenetic final session. I gather it was not quite like this in New Zealand.
The England innings was a bewildering affair. In the first hour batting looked well nigh impossible as Vernon Philander opened up with five consecutive maidens and a wicket, while Kagiso Rabada was quick enough to find steep bounce and to hit the England captain on the helmet. Yet in the first hour after lunch it looked a breeze; the boundaries flowed; the main scoreboard rattled along (metaphorically- it’s electric). Then there was mayhem that was often self-induced.
The simplest explanation is that it depended on who was batting and who was bowling. There remains a worryingly gulf between England’s best players and the rest. Moreover the older the ball, the less demanding the challenge, which made the mid-afternoon collapse when three wickets were lost in four overs all the more exasperating.
For all Rabada’s pace it was Philander who tormented the most.
He is a wonderful throwback to another age when hitting the seam time and time again was regarded as an art in itself. He seldom exceeds 80mph but the ball moves so frequently once it has left his magical fingers, just enough in the air or maybe a smidgeon off the pitch. Moreover he is so unusual at this level that he gets inside the batsmen’s minds.
He is to Test cricket what Darren Stevens, the ageless Kent all-rounder, is to county cricket. He wobbles the new ball devilishly and his opponents can become mesmerised. Opening batsmen fear him partly because he bowls so slowly.
Philander also propels some serious deliveries. His first to Rory Burns leapt from the pitch and flicked a glove on its passage to Quinton de Kock, who would finish with six victims behind the stumps. More conventionally a lifter from Rabada accounted for Dominic Sibley, whose Test match voyage so far confirms only that it is rather trickier batting in Test cricket than in the wide open spaces of Edgbaston.
Then the Joes, Denly and Root, combined in 55-run partnership that was mildly heroic. Denly, marooned at Philander’s end for most of the time did not score a run until his 28th delivery, by which time he had already been dropped at slip off Rabada.
Now the ball started to find the middle of Root’s bat rather than his helmet as he punched square on the off-side; Denly unveiled a couple of sumptuous boundaries and England were 60 for two at lunch. Run-scoring was possible after all and that remained the case after the break – despite the loss of Root.
The England captain thumped his bat in anger as he nibbled outside the off-stump against Philander. His dismissal is always a significant moment yet for the next hour Denly and Stokes gleaned runs at will. There were elegant, effortless drives from Denly while Stokes was middling just about everything; a pushed drive sped to the boundary and he proceeded to smite two innocent, consecutive deliveries from the left-arm spinner, Keshav Maharaj, over the mid-wicket boundary.
At 142 for three anything was possible but then came the fall at an alarming speed. The innings would last only another 15 overs. Denly, having posted his sixth half-century in Test cricket, was caught behind off his inside edge from the bowling of Dwaine Pretorius who could celebrate his maiden Test wicket.
In the next over, bowled by Anrich Nortje, Jonny Bairstow’s off-stump was disturbed; perhaps the ball kept low; perhaps he could have been forward; in Nortje’s next over Stokes, who had been imperious, drove without moving his feet and to his obvious fury edged to the keeper.
The innings soon disintegrated despite a few pleasing strokes from Sam Curran. Jos Buttler began with a sizzling cover drive against Pretorius but then he retreated into a shell. He is not a particularly good defensive batsman and maybe he needs reminding he has other qualities at the crease. England’s tail who are currently expanding at an alarming rate did not dally long.
Nor did South Africa’s upper order as Jimmy Anderson, Stuart Broad and Jofra Archer grabbed early wickets. When Archer was bowling it felt as if the ghost of T20 cricket had intruded. After four overs he had taken two for 31, including the wicket of Faf du Plessis, who was caught by Curran when hooking towards a crowded leg-side boundary. He then – unintentionally – propelled two slow beamers at the nightwatchman, Nortje, a bizarre end to a very bizarre day.