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80th over: South Africa 291 -8 (Jansen 43, Nortje 0) Potts will be a bit upset about this, I think. The only ball that hits the stumps is easily pushed down the ground by a single from Jansen. Had four balls to Nortje but didn’t hit the posts. There’s a bad looking bouncer, but Nortje is comfortably underneath.
The new ball has been taken. Belt!
79th over: South Africa 290-8 (Jansen 42, Nortje 0) Stokes is on his way and charging with all the intent you’d expect from the bristling skipper. Jansen looks solid and is able to convert a single to square. Nortje, however, looks less at home and is marred by a short that goes up to his ribs. However, credit where it’s due. Nortje rides the rebound and hits it with his bat. He won’t shy away from the challenge, that’s for sure.
“Hi Dan”, Hi Trevor Tutu (any relation to the great archbishop?)
“Greetings from a cold, wet Cape Town. I’m surprised, surprised you could have any doubts. The Proteas are obviously on their way to a famous victory. They’ll sprint to about four hundred at lunch, and England will be reeling this afternoon by 5-6 wickets per stumps. We will clean up the tail tomorrow morning and we have won by innings and 60 odd runs.”
Now calm down Trev, we’re not counting our chickens yet.
78th over: South Africa 289-8 (Jansen 41, Nortje 0) A successful start for England as Potts begins Day 3 with a maiden wicket. It is mostly short with Rabada and then Nortje who is the new man.
We’ve been chatting all morning about pitching it to the tailenders but it’s the short ball that gets Rabada going. Although only for a surprise from Broad.
Wicket! Rabada c Broad b Potts 3 (South Africa 289-8)
Stuart Broad! You can’t do that! What a catch from the great man. Rabada takes the short ball from Pott, the third delivery of the day, but misses his cross-bat to the leg side. Still, it’s sailing over Broad’s head at half-off, except no, it’s not! Broad sticks his arm out and the ball sticks to his hand. What a beauty this is and exactly what England needed first.
Updated at 11.04 BST
Then! Potts has the ball in his gloves. Here we come!
Inane bowling, this is the eye-catching headline from Neil Parkes email which reads:
“The concern I have is that just as the batting strategy is obviously taking advice from one-day techniques, the bowling strategy seems to be doing the same.
The difference is that an aggressive batting side can prevail in a bowling attack, it is risky but it can work. The reason it is risky is that the fielding and bowling restrictions that support this approach in a one-day context do not exist in Tests, and a composed and skilful bowling attachment should prevail. In practice that doesn’t seem to have happened this summer, and that’s great!
When playing in a one-day innings, the focus at the end of the match is to make up for the restrictions by bowling in front or bowling. The idea is that hitters are going to swing anyway and might end up at the boundary. In Tests, however, there are no such restrictions and the batsmen are not in such a hurry. The sneaking suspicion is that we are playing this way because this is the end of a day’s innings and of course bowling in the head seems ‘aggressive’ and is therefore ‘exciting’?
Yeah, I think you’re onto something. I wouldn’t defend six Yorkers in a row. But I would like to see more
There’s a Zak Crawley joke here, I just don’t see it.
The word of the day is a reminder of “ipsedixism” (18th century): the claim that something is “fact” based on one person’s opinion.
— Susie Dent (@susie_dent) August 18, 2022
“Good morning Dan, morning everyone”
Good morning Dan Ward. Good to hear from a fellow House of Dan!
“In reply to Mike D (10:26), while I freely admit to having played a strictly village level of cricket, some of the most wonderful moments of the Test summer so far have had a village feel to them – catches juggling, nonsense and unfortunate dismissals, captains who decide to hit him immediately without thinking about the position of the match.”
100% with you partner. It’s the absurdity that keeps this game alive.
“So maybe the notion of ‘hitting it on the stumps’ and that old captain’s plea to the bowler to ‘ask the question’ isn’t so far off? At village level, the question is often ‘what is 2+2” and the batsman usually knows the answer. But you can’t get them out if you don’t threaten the stumps, and you have to feel that Anderson, Broad, Potts, Stokes and Leach can do enough with the ball to hit a less experienced tail and at least keep the pressure on?”
You would think so. It could be argued that the English attack lacks the genuine pace that the South Africans have and we know these tailenders hate that extra push. Yet. Hit those sticks!
“The Guardian, like the English team, is writing again,” says Adrian Goldman. Uh, cheers mate.
“We had two days of a modern interface, where we could write comments directly instead of sending them by post, and now no more! Based on that, I expect SA to get 400 and England to lose by 100 or so . There will be no fifth day. :)”
Let me see. Looks like a good day to baptize. England could yet set a tricky target for the Saffas.
Our first correspondence of the morning comes from Mike D, who touches on something that absolutely bugs me:
“It was quite disheartening to see England, immediately after Broad removed Verreynne with a masterclass of length bowling, again trying to bounce the tail. I think a bit of Mikey Holding ‘You Miss, I Hit’ is called for this morning . Here’s hope.”
You are right Mike. It baffles me that bowlers, who are very skilled white bowlers, don’t target the stumps further down the order.
I remember seeing Broad and Wood carting the SA punches around the Wanderers a few years ago and it was amazing to see!
Elite company
Stuart Broad’s solitary strike places him in a select group of bowlers who have taken 100 scalps on a single ground.
Most test wkts on a single ground
166 : Muralitharan at Colombo (SSC)117 : Muralitharan at Kandy 117 : James Anderson at Lord’s*111 : Muralitharan at Galle102 : R Herath at Galle100 : Stuart Broad at Lord’s*
Broad made 100 Test weeks at Lord’s yesterday.#ENGvSA #ENGvsSA
— SportsAmaze (@Sports_amaze) August 19, 2022
Preamble: New Ground for New England
Four tests. Four notable chases in the fourth innings. Johnny Bairstow’s four swaggering tons.
The start of summer was like the start of a new dawn for England’s red ball team. It was a period when everything seemed to pulse with frenzied energy as they brushed aside New Zealand and then India to reshape the parameters of this ancient game.
Now they face a new challenge and must find a way to keep the good times going. After being bowled out for 165 with Kagiso Rabada’s 5-52 leading the way, England saw opener Sarel Erwee hit 73 and then Keshav Maharaj and Marco Jansen plundered a pair of 41 to take South Africa to 289- 7 and a lead of 124. .
Ben Stokes grabbed three wickets, including Erwee’s with a gut-wrenching bouncer, to drag his side into contention, but they will need a big success on day three to have a chance of winning.
Jansen remains unbeaten and has Rabada for company. Anrich Nortje and Lungi Ngidi are next, so England will want to wrap it up with quick wickets and get their pads on.
My name is Dan. I’m really looking forward to this. They say the third day of a test is “moving day”. Which way do you think this one is going?