South Africa v Australia: third men’s cricket Test, day two – live

Key events

32nd over: Australia 113-2 (Renshaw 39, Green 28) Rabada with an uneventful five balls, not doing much with it and giving up a couple of singles, so he gets annoyed and bashes one into Green’s body to end the over. Fast bowler’s perogative. Green wears it without demur.

“Everyone does it now, so I’m not picking on you,” begins Michael Quinnell with an ominous glint in his text, “but where did this infuriating trend come from to summarise the game by stating that the side batting second is “trailing” when they haven’t yet competed their 1st innings. I’m sure someone today said ‘Australia are 0-0 at the start of play today, trailing by 329’. What utter nonsense! They cannot possibly be trailing until they are all out – if they pass the SA score with wickets in hand they would then be ‘leading’.”

It seems linguistically straightforward to me, Michael: the team batting second are trailing until they’re in front, in the same way that footballers are 28 until they’re 29.

If Australia are at some stage on 330 then they’ll be leading by one. If they’re on 328 they’ll be trailing by one. It’s not a permanent state while the innings is still live, and as you say, won’t be formalised until the innings is complete, but the relative state still exists in the moment.

I agree it’s redundant to give that number when a team is 0-0, but when partway through an innings, it’s relevant to know the batting team’s score in relation to the team that has already batted. Not sure how else to describe it.

32nd over: Australia 111-2 (Renshaw 38, Green 27) Smoked! Green uses all of Coetzee’s pace, striking the ball through point with a straight bat, just placing the blade there. All timing. Nasty bouncer is Coetzee’s riposte, Green getting under it like the BFG trying to come in for breakfast with the Queen. Bouncer again, and Green bends at the knees, trying to resist the urge to lift his gloves, but they were wavering up there, halfway there and then dragged back, skirmishes in a man at war with himself.

The partnership is worth 53.

31st over: Australia 107-2 (Renshaw 38, Green 23) Even Renshaw’s streaky boundaries are well played. Very softly met defensive shot facing Rabada, which kills the outside edge as it leaves the bat, and sees it roll sweetly to the rope through that cordon gap that has been profitable for Australia today. That luck is followed up with two intentional runs, with what is quickly becoming the Renshaw signature of the tuck off his pads, like old-school Steve Smith without the line-dancing preface.

Huge reprieve from the third umpire

30th over: Australia 99-2 (Renshaw 31, Green 22) This will raise the same old debates, and Harmer will be filthy about the decision made here. Cam Green survives a big edge to slip, pace from Coetzee, high on the bat, and the ball heads down and to the right of Simon Harmer at second slip. He gets down to it, ends up with the ball in his hands, and immediately launches into a celebration. He took a couple of wonderful catches in Gqeberha, and knows what he’s doing in that position, so his confidence means something in this situation.

Green, though, stands his ground, and the referral goes up to Umpire Gaffaney in the box. He says that Harmer’s hands are apart as the ball approaches, and that he thinks the ball has hit the ground. I don’t agree with that at all. We know the problems with front-on cameras having deceptive results. From here it looks like a common case of the ball landing on Harmer’s fingertips as they lie on the ground, and from there bouncing up into the palms.

That’s the decision, though. Will it hurt South Africa, or can they conjure another wicket-taking ball?

29th over: Australia 99-2 (Renshaw 31, Green 22) Here’s Rabada, at last. It doesn’t start to well for him, though, cut for four by Green, then flicked gracefully off the pads by Renshaw. Give him an over to warm up, ok.

Here’s Eamonn Maloney. “I think last Test after 99 all out you said something to the effect that the Australian psyche cannot compute abject failure. The foreseeable future looks a notch or two better than that at least, perhaps call it studied mediocrity – so are we really much better at tolerating that? How did the fans look on the deeds of the sometimes ok-ish teams of the early to mid 80s? Once Smith is gone our best might be Head for a few years, averaging 42, blazing the odd ton, while a succession of Shield battlers are tried and discarded, and there’ll be a Rodney Hogg or two come through to replace the bowling greats, probably no one to match their feats though…”

Australians won’t take it well! People older than my vintage, who remember that era, still talk about a very poor years in the mid-80s like they were a source of generational trauma. So painful were those years to Australians that they fired Allan Border’s furious determination into building the era of dominance that followed, picked up by Mark Taylor, then Steve Waugh, then Ricky Ponting. The intensity of Australian players through that later era was all fuelled by remembering a brief time when the team was not very good. Not dismal, just not great.

It was a little similar between about 2008 and 2012, perhaps, with some middling sides turning out. People hated that, too. Remember the Argus Review?

I think the upcoming bowling ranks are looking pretty good. Xavier Bartlett, Spencer Johnson, Jumping Jhye, Lance Morris, Riley Meredith, Callum Vidler, Mahli Beardman, several more quicks besides, along with a few spinners, surely Australia can get some decent attacks out of that batch even with injuries and franchise demands. The batting, though, may be as you say.

28th over: Australia 90-2 (Renshaw 27, Green 17) Coetzee to start up after lunch, and if that’s with the intention of bouncing Green, then it’s a bad choice because Renshaw is on strike. He soaks up the whole over, leaving where possible, ducking bouncers, squeezing out a yorker. Looks an opener.

Play is about to resume in Cape Town.

“It does seem that Head’s primary mode of dismissal is played on,” writes Tom Barrington. “Is there any data out there that could show how many times he’s got out like this, and compare this to other players and modes of dismissal?”

Certainly easy enough to track his percentage of dismissals bowled, and to split those by different periods of his career, because he didn’t used to get out that way so often. I don’t quite have time to run the numbers mid-blog, but someone else is welcome to do the Statsguru bit and email me.

“When Trav’s in the mood, doing ‘Trav things’ as they say, it is quite easy to forget Test cricket is quite hard,” writes Gervase Greene. “Yes, there’s some of the ‘see ball, hit ball’ about him, but he still manages to look like a bloke who wouldn’t mind a beer if this lark oddly ends a little bit prematurely. In this era of sometimes beige Mac-Cricket, he really is quite the original.”

A lot of that is why people want to see him open, because it’s fun that he walks out there and doesn’t care for convention. Fun when it works, not strategic long-term.

There was a fair bit of Travis Head correspondence during the first session, so let’s have a look. Starting with Michael Hall regarding the first-wicket stand. “South Africa didn’t bowl badly but Australia took their chances well. Is this the opening partnership the Australians have been looking for?”

I’m still not sold on Head opening, simply on the basis of probability: he’s such a proven damaging player in the middle order, and playing him up top means that he’s more likely to get out cheaply more often. You’ll get more bang for buck from him by playing him where it’s safer to bat, and using someone more defensively capable where it isn’t.

Yes, he has some amazing opening innings, but a lot of those were beating up a broken England attack that was tailor made to feed runs to that style of player. And it doesn’t help a team if their opener regularly makes low scores when conditions are tough batting first. You need someone who’ll survive that.

In short, you get value from him opening, but probably more if he were in the middle behind a good opening pair.

Lunch – Australia 90 for 2, trail in the first innings by 239

Another eventual session, though of a different type to yesterday. We had 27 overs bowled on day one, and the same on day two, but South Africa were 140 without loss from theirs. Australia a more modest 90 for 2, though Travis Head was threatening that 140 when he was up and running.

But he’s gone, couldn’t go large today, and if there is to be a big score, it will have to come via the Matt Renshaw method, one of patient accumulation. Green can play that way as well, but him getting his tempo and concentration right on return to this arena will be the challenge.

They missed a trick not having Rabada bowl to Green at the start, surely he must do so right after lunch.

27th over: Australia 90-2 (Renshaw 27, Green 17) Jansen to finish off the session, with Renshaw again collecting a single into the leg side. Green might have considered defending his way to lunch, but instead he crushes the last ball of the session for four! Huge cover drive, very wide of the stumps but if anyone has the reach, he’s the one. Cannoned to the fence. Different reaction if he’d edged that to slip or hit it to the cover fielder! It was in the air…

26th over: Australia 85-2 (Renshaw 26, Green 13) Coetzee replaces Harmer, double change. Beats Renshaw’s outside edge, then gives up a glanced single. The plan might be for Coetzee to bump Green, but he doesn’t get the chance, first ball at his hip and it’s knocked away for a run. Same again for Renshaw gives Coetzee two more balls at Green, potentially. And he does use one to go short! Fierce short ball at throat height, Green uses all of his height to get his gloves right over it and drop it safely away, but that would not have been fun. Coetzee’s last ball strays down leg, beating everyone for four byes.

25th over: Australia 78-2 (Renshaw 24, Green 12) Now we have Jansen, who only bowled four overs this morning, back for another burst. Strays on the legs twice, worked for singles.

24th over: Australia 76-2 (Renshaw 23, Green 11) A couple of runs for Renshaw, driving Harmer uppishly through point. “Ohh my f***!” screams a South African fielder, loudly captured by the stump mic, sending the commentary box into frantic flailing.

23rd over: Australia 73-2 (Renshaw 21, Green 10) Another edge from Green facing Mulder, and this time it nets the batter four runs, past the second slip into the gap to gully. Mulder is annoyed, smashes a bouncer into the pitch, so fiercely that it clears the wicketkeeper, but first slip makes an unusual intervention by saving four extras! Dives across to pluck the ball one-handed. So the umpire calls a wide, but not the extras that would have come from the ball reaching the boundary. Mulder overcorrects for the next ball, and Green drives that for four.

22nd over: Australia 63-2 (Renshaw 21, Green 1) Harmer continues, and Renshaw scores a run from the first ball, worked into the leg side, before Green gets off the mark from the sixth in similar fashion.

21st over: Australia 61-2 (Renshaw 20, Green 0) You’d get Rabada or Jansen back on to target Green, wouldn’t you? New to the fight, new to the middle, but now probably the key player if he gets in? Neither of them bowled a lengthy spell up top. Mulder it is, however, and from his bowling Renshaw finally moves off 17! He drives a couple of runs through cover, then adds a single the same way. Green immediately nicks a defensive push, but at Mulder’s pace it doesn’t carry to slip.

20th over: Australia 58-2 (Renshaw 17, Green 0) Cameron Green, now. Coming back from injury, hasn’t played a Test since August against Bangladesh, when he was Australia’s best in a series far more challenging than anyone realistically expected. Very open stance against Harmer, which combined with Green’s height, you would think would give Harmer a lot of chance to hit pad. Huge targets that Green is wearing. No run from the over.

19th over: Australia 58-2 (Renshaw 17, Green 0) Renshaw, as he did in Durbab, looks to shrug off all of this palaver, remaining firmly in his zone of calm in the middle. He blocks out the Mulder over like he’s tuning up in a net.

18th over: Australia 58-2 (Renshaw 17, Green 0) Incredible double-strike over from Harmer. It was a big call to leave out Maharaj for Gqeberha, and stick to that choice here, but Harmer justified it with the bat in the previous Test, and does so with the ball here. He was picked to take out left-handers, but he’s got the right-handed Labuschagne in his last two innings as well.

WICKET! Labuschagne c Markram b Harmer 0, Australia 58-2

I had just typed: “Thus we come to the biggest story of the day. Marnus Labuschagne, propped up at the bar in the Last Chance Saloon.” Well, he’s been kicked out. His money’s no good here. That could really be the end of Labuschagne’s Test career, second innings notwithstanding. This is the knock that mattered. First dig, Smith missing, Head out, desperately needing senior leadership, and he, as the player most qualified to fill that role, has lasted less than an over. Just a normal off-break outside the line of his stumps, no evident turn, skips on straight, no footwork from him, prods at it defensively, and edges low down to slip.

WICKET! Head b Harmer 41, Australia 58-1

Chopped on again! Again, again, again. How, in a setup with so many coaches and so much support, can a key player keep getting out the same way and not have it addressed? That’s a poor shot from Head, the very first ball he faces from Harmer, going back and trying to heave a cut shot away. His weight is nowhere, his balance is off, he’s lurching back but has one foot off the ground while throwing hands at that ball, too close to his body as well, not short enough. It’s just sloppy in every way, and his modest first-innings record opening continues, despite perfect conditions.

What a waste. But what a move from Bavuma. Spinner on, wicket first ball.

17th over: Australia 58-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 41) A lusty swing from Head, but one run from Mulder with deep point back. Down to two slips now for Renshaw, who shifts across his stumps slightly to defend back to the bowler. Last ball of the over sees the first dynamic shot Renshaw has played in a while, seeing a nice half volley and driving it, but hits it directly to cover. Shrugs his shoulders and gets on with the job.

Australia have 58. A mere hundred more to match South Africa’s opening stand!

16th over: Australia 57-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 40) This time they opt for parsimony: no boundary, just a single first ball of the over, before Renshaw blocks out the rest of Coetzee’s pace. He’s playing very late, very watchful.

15th over: Australia 56-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 39) Head keeps going, he’s past his first-innings opening average now. Belts Mulder square of the wicket on the off side, off a length, then rotates strike. Renshaw sees out the rest, though a late yorker challenges him. This is a good system for Australia: Head 4, Head 1, Renshaw block.

14th over: Australia 51-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 34) Smashed by Head! Coetzee gives pace on the ball, Head gives pace off the bat. Drops down low and demolishes the first ball of the over through cover. Second ball? Up and over! Less controlled, perhaps, like the earlier one that he tried to play so close to his body, but gets enough of a piece of it. Then, smartly, doesn’t try to triple down, but takes a single. Renshaw has been sitting on 17 for six overs, and sees out this one to make it seven.

13th over: Australia 42-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 25) Over to Wiaan Mulder, who was crucial with the ball in Gqeberha, taking big wickets at big times. He’s a shorter and skiddier bowler than his stablemates, so he can surprise with a different trajectory, as well as swing early or seam later. A single from his first over.

12th over: Australia 41-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 24) Coetzee to Renshaw, that’s quick! He cranks up the speed gun that over, through the high 140s and eventually hits 150. The downside for him, around the wicket to the left-hander, is that everything is too far outside off stump to make Renshaw play, bar the last ball that draws a defensive push. That miss means there is no contact of bat on ball in the over.

11th over: Australia 41-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 24) Travis! He does a Renshaw impression facing Rabada, a very light leave based on the length of the ball. Nipping back but going over. Even this new monkish mindset though won’t stop Head hitting a half volley, and with almost no foot movement, all eye, he does exactly that, just the slightest shuffle towards the off side, but he strikes that through the covers to end the over well.

Updated at 05.24 EDT

10th over: Australia 37-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 20) Time for a change, here is Gerald Coetzee. He had the broad black headband on in the ODIs, but has gone for the classic traditional white headband for Tests, just as I’m sure Terror Turner and Demon Spofforth used to wear. He, like many before him, starts his day being cut for four by Head, always taking on the width with a right-armer’s angle across the lefty. And then, like many before him, almost bowls Head dragging on, this time the batter getting lucky. It’s become a genuine problem for Head in the past year.

9th over: Australia 32-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 15) Travis Head getting off strike facing Rabada may well be a great move for Australia. A glance achieves that, hopping and poking the ball away, allowing Renshaw to soak up most of the over. As a batting team, you just want Rabada’s spell done with no damage. A bit of damage to Renshaw’s shoulder, as he wears a short ball and smiles it off. Plays the line well, too, even when the ball does deck away. Not many have done, but Rabada has produced a couple, as has Jansen.

8th over: Australia 31-0 (Renshaw 17, Head 14) There’s been a lot of talk about Head as an opener, some people saying he should go back to five where he prospered, others scoffing and pointing as his good overall numbers, averaging near 50. The thing is that all of his big scores as opener have come in the second innings, when the match situation is clearer. He averages literally twice as much as he does in his first innings, when conditions are usually tougher. He’s averaging 67 vs 33 on that split.

So today is a chance for a big first-innings score. Although, given its the second innings of the match, this still isn’t the same as a tricky session-one challenge on the first day, with the ball moving around in the gloom. In the first innings of matches, rather than his first team innings, he averages 23 opening.

Adds a single here, struck to deep point but they have a sweeper back. So it’s Renshaw who does the boundary scoring, playing a fine on-drive from Jansen.

7th over: Australia 26-0 (Renshaw 13, Head 13) Three slips and two gullies for Rabada bowling to Renshaw, after Head slips away from strike again. Renshaw happy to leave where he can. He made his first impression in Test cricket at the age of 20 by leaving a lot of balls at Adelaide Oval, and in the peak “play your natural game” era of Aussie bats booming drives to slip, people fell upon his innings like desert-walkers quenching thirst at an oasis.

6th over: Australia 25-0 (Renshaw 13, Head 12) South Africa really blew a chance after that opening stand yesterday. It was 158 in quick time, and they looked on track to make the biggest score against Australia after being sent in. That record is 479, built on the famous Viv Richards 208 at the MCG in 1984. Instead of that, South Africa got nowhere near it, and their 329 all out finished up 17th on that list.

Head flashes outside off again, and again finds the boundary Jansen now the bowler wincing. That wasn’t even wide, Head leaned back to create room for his hands, and took the ball almost from the line of off stump. Again, follows it up by dashing the single, challenging Bavuma’s whirring legs. Renshaw leaves.

5th over: Australia 20-0 (Renshaw 13, Head 7) Streaky bacon! That’s for breakfast in the Head household. Width from Rabada, nearly caught at gully, though a gully for Head is set deeper, more like a conventional backward point. Head flashes the bat at this width and steers it past the fielder’s right hand by a metre or two. Next ball, tries to uppercut over the slips a ball that’s too close to his body. Things that are not conventional for opening the batting, but nor is he, and seeing the Ackerman and Markram stand yesterday will have only reiterated to Head that he can score quickly out here. Bowlers in the game, though. He plays more conventionally by taking a single to cover.

4th over: Australia 15-0 (Renshaw 13, Head 2) Some luck for Renshaw there, edges the ball along the ground behind point while looking to turn it to leg. It rolls down to the fence, with fielders up around the bat early. He ends the over with a more convincing shot for four, clipped off a leg-stump line, past the short leg catcher, lovely timing. There was a good leave in between those, too, a ball that he leaves on length even though it’s angling in, and goes over the off bail. Well over. Considering that he was bowled while leaving in Gqeberha, that’s brave.

3rd over: Australia 7-0 (Renshaw 5, Head 2) In typical Travis Head style, he hasn’t faced many balls, doesn’t look convincing with the shot, but scores runs. Two of them from a thick inside edge off Rabada, into the leg side, and almost four more as he reaches very wide to flirt with a ball outside off, lucky not to middle rather than nick it, but unlucky to find backward point.

2nd over: Australia 5-0 (Renshaw 5, Head 0) All 12 balls so far have been faced by Renshaw, after that sixth-ball single. He carries on as he played in Durban, leaving wherever possible. Jansen does beat his edge at one stage, getting movement away, but Renshaw doesn’t follow the ball. When Jansen ends the over going short at the body, Renshaw gets gloves underneath it. Very organised defensive approach to the over.

1st over: Australia 5-0 (Renshaw 5, Head 0) Lovely bounce and carry from Rabada with the new ball. Two left-handers for him to aim at. The sun is shining again, the sky brilliantly blue, it looks a lovely day on the Cape. You’d best believe the mountain is hulking over the shoulder of the ground like a suspicious bouncer. Rabada doesn’t use the bouncer himself, comes around the wicket after a few balls but bowls a low full toss, and Renshaw with placement rather than effort deflects his square drive behind point for four, then takes one.

It’s Kagiso Rabada firing up the engines! Renshaw in his sights. This is good stuff.

We’re about to start play in Cape Town, so let’s have at it.

Meanwhile, Cricket Australia’s AGM has been the forum for them to announce a big annual profit, which they’re also using to further argue that they should privatise part of their operation because they need the money. Funny how their answer to every scenario is the same one.

While we’re on the subject of former England bowlers, always worth considering the one who probably still believes, in his heart of hearts, that he should still be a current England bowler – and perhaps he’s right. James Anderson, bless him, still kicking, via Emma John.

Our reader Rowan Sweeney suggested posting this article, purely as an exercise in underlining that Chris Woakes is a solid human being. I’ll do that because those of us working at this joint think the same of Ali Martin.

Here’s our match report from yesterday.

double quotation markFor a time, it was heading up there with the worst. David Gower at Leeds in 1989, when Australia topped 600 and declared. Nasser Hussain in Brisbane, 2002, when Australia were 364 for two by the end of the day. Edgbaston 2005, where England lamped 407 from 80 overs. Those were the looming comparisons for captains deciding to bowl at the toss, after Pat Cummins did the same in the third Test at Cape Town, only for South Africa’s openers to smash 140 by lunch. Yet, by day’s end, Australia had taken 10 for a further 189, Mitchell Starc destroying the tail with four wickets in six balls, 329 all out constituting a serious Australian comeback.

For those pondering why that batting sequence would be questionable, consider this.

Travis Head: lots of runs as opener in his second innings of matches, bugger all the first time he bats.
Matt Renshaw: was supposed to be the opener, then got bumped to five, made a ton first Test, had a poor second Test, and now has been moved back up top.
Marnus Labuschagne: playing for his spot, no hundreds in three years, keeps making 30s on this tour and then getting out.
Josh Inglis: is not Steve Smith, who is out with a stiff neck.
Cameron Green: coming back in after an injury layoff, still trying to prove himself as the genuine article with the bat at this level.
Alex Carey: mostly poor run since moving to six, averaging 20 in his last seven Tests.
Cooper Connolly: spare-change pick to have him batting at seven, in the squad as a future talent, never made a first-class ton.

Preamble

Geoff Lemon

Hello, friends. You’re back. Why wouldn’t you be? Day one of this third Test in Cape Town was a barnstormer. How often do you see a team sent in, none for a hundred at lunch, and all out by stumps? It twisted, it turned, it rocked, it rolled, and it had Double Richard umpiring duties in the middle for Dick Kettleborough’s 100th Test. We can at least guarantee the continuation of the umpiring part, barring any more illness absences like the one that took out Chris Gaffaney in the previous match.

Australia ended the day happier, after Mitch Starc’s absurd ending burst of 6 for 10, and South Africa started it happier, after Aiden Markram and Marques Ackerman flayed everything in the first session. Now everyone will have had a night’s sleep to calm down, and then it will be time to see whether Australia’s heavily rejigged batting lineup can put anything reasonable together.

South Africa v Australia: third men’s cricket Test, day two – live | Cricket

Huge reprieve from the third umpire

Lunch – Australia 90 for 2, trail in the first innings by 239

WICKET! Labuschagne c Markram b Harmer 0, Australia 58-2

WICKET! Head b Harmer 41, Australia 58-1

Preamble

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