Cape Town — The opening day of the home Test summer between the Proteas and the West Indies served up some absorbing cricket.
IOL Sport’s Zaahier Adams gives us the plays of day one from Centurion:
1. Drop
Dean Elgar would have walked out to the middle with all sorts of things still buzzing in his head after being stripped of the Test captaincy recently. Another failure at Centurion would have opened up the debate about his continued presence in the Test team. But thankfully for him, Jermaine Blackwood shelled a regulation chance in the slip cordon early on, which allowed Elgar to settle in.
2. Catch
It may not have made up for his earlier miss, but Blackwood pulled off a stunner while running back to hold onto an Elgar ramp down to third man. Elgar was not smiling this time around.
3. Shot
Aiden Markram struck some superb boundaries during his 115, but none were sweeter than a cover drive that raced to the boundary early on in his innings. The delivery was slightly over-pitched, but Markram just leant on it to sweetly time it to the boundary without moving an inch.
4. Ball
Alzarri Joseph was undoubtedly the standout West Indian bowler on the opening day. He worked up a good head of steam and sent down a couple of peaches that flirted with debutant Tony de Zorzi’s outside edge. However, it was going to take something special to dismiss Markram in the form he was in, and Joseph nailed a yorker that crashed into the centurion’s stumps.
5. Selection
There were new Test beginnings for debutant Tony de Zorzi and Gerald Coetzee, while Senuran Muthasamy’s all-round skills were preferred to those of experienced slow left-armer Keshav Maharaj. It showed that new coach Shukri Conrad and captain Temba Bavuma are not afraid to make the difficult calls.
IOL Sport