South Africa levelled their four-Test series against Australia yesterday by recording a six-wicket win in Port Elizabeth. Here are three of the major talking points nine days’ ahead of the third Test in Cape Town.
Australia need a lift from Nathan Lyon
Leading into this Test series Lyon was the in-form Test spinner in the world, having taken 63 wickets at 23 last year, including five five-fors in 11 Tests. He had finally conquered Asia, bowling well in India and dominating in Bangladesh, and had then been a major factor in Australia’s 4-0 Ashes win.
(AAP Image/Richard Wainwright)
Lyon had seemingly earned the complete faith of his skipper Steve Smith, who routinely brought him on at key moments to try to conjure a wicket.
As much was evident in the first hour of South Africa’s first innings in this series, when Smith called upon Lyon after just seven overs.
SA had made a bright start and Australia’s new ball bowlers had been loose, so Smith asked Lyon to turn the tide. He did just that, dismissing quality batsmen Hashim Amla and Dean Elgar in his first over, and pushing the match firmly in Australia’s favour.
It was a stunning start to the series for Lyon, one which suggested he may well torment SA. But in Lyon’s following 69 overs, stretching to the start of yesterday’s play, he took 1-194.
Those figures are a touch unkind to the Aussie veteran, who delivered many good spells during that time. But the fact remains he has been clearly outperformed so far in this series by Proteas spinner Keshav Maharaj, who has snared 11 wickets.
The strength of Australia’s attack in recent times has been how well they’ve meshed as a group, earning each other wickets with their relentlessness. Lyon must lift if the Australian attack is to return to its menacing best.
Rabada could become the best Test quick of all time
Incredibly, at just 22 years old, the South African prodigy already has more 10-wicket hauls in his career than Glenn McGrath, who many people consider to be the greatest Test paceman in history.
Rabada’s 10-wicket haul yesterday was his fourth in Test cricket, and he’s still a year younger than McGrath was when the Australian made his Test debut.
Kagiso Rabada (Photo by Ashley Vlotman/Gallo Images/Getty Images)
But the most astonishing Rabada stat is his Test strike rate of 38.9, which is the second-best by any bowler in history to have taken more than 100 wickets. The only man ahead of him in that category finished his Test career 122 years ago – England’s George Lohmann.
In third place, after Rabada, is his Proteas teammate Dale Steyn, who is easily the best Test bowler of the past decade and ranks alongside the likes of McGrath, Malcolm Marshall, Wasim Akram, Curtly Ambrose, Dennis Lillee and Richard Hadlee as an all-time great.
Rabada’s career trajectory is so steep that, if he avoids major injury problems, he could potentially eclipse all of those legends. He is a phenomenally well-rounded quick for someone so young. There is not an attribute he doesn’t possess – pace, bounce, accuracy, swing, guile, stamina and strength.
Like all of the truly great fast bowlers in history, the state of the pitch doesn’t have a major influence on Rabada’s impact, he finds a way to either exploit favourable conditions or overcome unfavourable ones.
The Australian batsmen will be mightily relieved if he is banned from the last two Tests for repeated poor behaviour.
[latest_videos_strip category=”cricket” name=”Cricket”]
AB de Villiers has a huge amount of Test cricket left in him
De Villiers has been, by a big margin, the best batsman in this series so far. The 34-year-old’s ton in the first innings of this match was one of the best Test hundreds scored against Australia in the past decade.
In a match where most batsmen struggled for fluency, de Villiers cruised to 126no from 146 balls, with 21 boundaries.
The ease with which he countered the reverse swing of the Aussie quicks was incredible. It was the same story yesterday as de Villiers arrived at the crease with SA under heavy pressure at 2-32 and with his batting partner Amla struggling against both Lyon and his nemesis Josh Hazlewood.
De Villiers once more batted as if he was utterly unaffected by the circumstances, immediately turning the pressure back on to Australia by sprinting to 25 from 14 balls.
It remains to be seen just how much longer de Villiers will play Test cricket. Before this series he had played just four Tests in the prior two years, having sat out for a lengthy period for a variety of reasons.
Whether his body can withstand the rigours of several more years of being a full-time Test cricketer I cannot claim to know. But it is abundantly clear de Villiers remains one of the truly elite Test cricketers in the world, a man capable of bending even the best bowling attacks to his will.
DavSA
Guest
Rabada should rather have decked Smith . Then again smacking a child is illegal in SA.
Jeff
Guest
" Maybe he didn’t want to throw the ball in celebration in case it landed on ABDV?" And here we have it, folks. Some Aussies are just not capable of objectivity when their countrymen are involved and will go to the most ridiculous lengths to protect their guys. You and Matthew should really get rid of the eye patch.
Jake
Guest
Come on Jeff. You don't know what the intent was. Nathan Lyon isn't that sort of player. Maybe he didn't want to throw the ball in celebration in case it landed on ABDV? Who knows? You think Jeff Crowe, a kiwi, is bias towards Australia? Thats a pretty big slur on a respected former player, former NZ captain and your fellow Kiwi. I think your insinuating things here to back up your argument.
Jeff
Guest
Jake, the intent was there and he was lucky it dropped just a few inches from AB. If it had fallen on AB directly, then he would have have not been able to be protected by the umpires, Aussie or not. However, it did roll on and hit AB therefore there was contact but Jeff Crowe showed his bias and let him off with just a grade one level offence. I expected Matthew to come up with the weak argument that the ball wasn't in Lyon's hand. Tell me then Matthew, does that meant if a batsman threw the bat at a bowler, that would not constitute as contact to you ? See Samuels v Warne in a Big Bash match a few years ago. We can go all day here, Matthew and I can and will continue to expose the massive holes in your argument.
Perry Bridge
Guest
A guy like Hadlee was a supreme technician - a bit tear away initially but through the 80s he was just class. And that's where a guy like Marshall too - bustling and busy but he also became a superb technician - when guys can bowl at express pace but also swing and cut both ways it makes batting very tricky. Reverse swing is interesting to read about - it seems that Sarfraz Nawaz was the conscious inventor of it and via Imran to Akram and Waqar - the Pakistanis mastered it.
Perry Bridge
Guest
#soapit no worries - - I was curious anyway. I haven't actually seen enough of him myself on tele - but going by stats - - he looks super. The irony is for me that the bowler he reminds me the most of is B.P.Patterson - - just a much better version!!
Bobbo7
Guest
I must say Matthew, must you add all those condescending lines into your comments? "Here. Educate yourself" ... "to make it easier for you" ... "See? Simple answer" ... "the ICC. Obviously"... "This is not difficult stuff. Why does it need explaining" ... "If you bothered to look at the offence... " Obviously explaining this to us simpletons who just want to rant is frustrating but you can get the message across without the negativety. Not having a go, just a suggestion as you clearly know your stuff.
Bobbo7
Guest
I understand the system. However the system is a joke. All it does is weaken SA in what is growing into a fantastic series. How does this benefit Test cricket? While I don't condone the behaviour of Rabada or Warner none of this should result in match bans. Reduce the match fees ... the ban only weakens the series and hurts the game. Now if they were getting into fist fights then I accept bans would be appropriate.
shiftyxr
Guest
It's taken a while but you finally get it
Worlds Biggest
Guest
Yep need Lyon to step up rest of the series but same goes for the whole team. Thought they were average and outplayed. Rabada is a fine bowler, the Proteas are well set post Morkel and Steyn. AB’s ton was a match winner.
peter chrisp
Guest
Have to agree i guess there is no love lost between either side but gee give it a rest i mean how many times do they have to play the so called incidents either side is not backing down on what they think & who was in the right or wrong and we all have our opinions can we move on?
I am not suggesting anything, merely questioning the outcome
Nudge
Guest
There was no problem with batting first. The ball reversed throughout the whole match. Conventional swing was at its most prominent in the first session of the match when Australia got through to 98 with out loss just before lunch. At 0-98 and 3-170 odd we just shouldn’t have been bowled out for 240. That’s where the test was lost
Fergus
Roar Rookie
Yeah, so next time someone match fixes, or ball tampers we'll just fine him. When your earning alot of money fines aren't a huge disincentive, not being able to play however is. It's why captains can now be suspended for slow over rates, fines weren't doing anything so they introduced a harsher penalty to dissuade teams from doing it. At lower levels of cricket run penalties are applied for slow over rates, at the high level they don't want to do that as they want the best team to win hence the bans. The only other thing they could do is send players off the field if they commit an offence they deem inappropriate, the problem with that of course is sending a fielder off the field is basically giving them a rest.
Fergus
Roar Rookie
"Threat of assault on a player, team official, or spectator”" Lol, so every time someone gets into a heated argument they should be charged with attempted assault.
Matt P
Roar Rookie
Yep. Well spotted Jake. No. It's not. The ball is not part of his body, hence it is not physical contact. As you admitted just before, Lyon didn't actually even drop the ball on him, so he wouldn't have a case to answer there anyway. "Using your logic, a batsman could use his bat and hit a bowler with it and it doesn’t constitute as contact." That's not actually the same logic, because that involves the batsman deliberately using the bat as a club and swinging. Bat in hand = physical contact. Lyon has dropped the ball. Ball not in hand =/= physical contact. If he deliberately placed (not dropped, placed) the ball on AB, then you would have a case. But he didn't, so you don't. "You need to stop looking for ways to twist things and look at the facts. You seem incapable of doing that." You might want to stay away from those sort of statements if you're going to contradict yourself in the same breath.
Fergus
Roar Rookie
If lyon wasn't used too much in the first innings because the conditions were pace friendly one really has to question the logic of batting first.
Brian
Guest
Err that's actually my point Singh got off because it was the BCCI.
Jake
Guest
So you're trying to diminish Australia's eventual series win, saying it doesn't count because your boy can't control himself and got suspended.
Jake
Guest
Nah. He only said that about the poms. They don't matter.