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South Africa go into day four of the fourth Test against England in a very commanding position and will be hoping to completely bat them out of the game. Join The Roar for live scores from 7:30pm (AEDT).
Although the series is already gone for South Africa, there has still been plenty to play for in this final Test match, and that is best evaluated by some of the brilliant individual performances we have seen with both the bat and the ball that have got South Africa into this position.
Going into the fourth day, South Africa hold the advantage by 175 runs with nine wickets remaining in their second innings. After centuries from debutant Stephen Cook along with Hashim Amla and Quinton De Kock guided them to the score of 475 in the first innings, England capitulated for 342 in their first innings, after Kagiso Rabada took seven wickets, running through England with pace and swing.
For England, Alistair Cook, Joe Root and Moeen Ali played fighting hands but struggled to guide the ship to safety, with no one going onto the big century that was really needed to compete with the score South Africa had posted.
Now into their second innings, South Africa sit on 1 for 42 with Amla and Cook at the crease, looking very comfortable as they got to stumps.
From here, you would imagine South Africa will really look to ramp up the pace of their innings. With the likes of AB De Villiers to come in, it will be up to Amla and Cook to start strongly and keep a reasonable clip going to their scoring, before handing over to the big hitters.
Judging by the scores and the wicket, which hasn’t seemed to deteriorate very much yet, South Africa will be wanting to leave themselves a lot of time to knock England over. Expect the declaration, if England don’t manage to run through South Africa to come within the first two sessions, given the lead is already 175.
Prediction
It will be South Africa that win this Test unless England somehow find a way to hold on for the draw. Whether it is in four or five days, remains to be seen, but it seems like a lot would have to happen for the match to end today.
Join The Roar for live scores of the fourth day in the fourth Test between South Africa and England from 7:30pm (AEDT) and don’t forget to leave a comment in the section below as the match unfolds.
Follow Scott on Twitter @sk_pryde