Ken Borland

The North-West Dragons won the toss and elected to bat first in their CSA 4-Day Series match against the Northerns Titans at Centurion on Sunday, but their innings soon spiralled out of control and they were bowled out for just 148.

Northerns had reached 18 for one in reply when bad light stopped play.

Junior Dala set the ball rolling when his short ball outside off-stump saw a hooking Grant Mokoena (4) looping the ball to mid-on.

Aya Gqamane, curving the ball back into the right-handers, then trapped both Lesego Senokwane (14) and Shaylin Pillay (18) lbw, before Senuran Muthusamy (13), swivelling on a pull shot, hit the ball straight to midwicket as the Eastern Cape product finished with figures of three for 40 in 13 overs, doing most of the damage in a marvellous bowling display by the Titans.

Dala then returned to claim his second wicket, Khanya Cotani (0) edging a drive and being well-taken in the slips by Donovan Ferreira, as North-West crashed to 83 for six.

JP King (38) and Duan Jansen (37) provided some resistance with a seventh-wicket stand of 47, but the entire innings was all over in four hours, just 56.2 overs.

Apart from Gqamane and Dala, the Northerns production line of fast bowlers looks promising with both Merrick Brett (11-5-20-2) and Matthew Boast (14-4-41-1) impressing on their first-class debuts for the Titans. Left-arm spinner Neil Brand also collected two late wickets.

The Titans were only able to bat for six overs before play was prematurely ended by an approaching storm, but Brand reached 14 not out in that time. Jiveshan Pillay was with him on four not out, after the dismissal of Modiri Litheko for a duck.

He was undone by some fine bowling by Renaldo Meyer: a big inswinger the previous ball led to an unsuccessful lbw appeal, but the next delivery was perfectly pitched, Litheko came forward to defend, but a beautiful away-swinger found the edge of his bat to have him caught behind.

Lions v Dolphins

Conditions were all in the batsmen’s favour in Potchefstroom on Sunday as the KZN Dolphins amassed 181 for two against the Central Gauteng Lions in their match, before play was washed out in the afternoon.

The Lions did manage to make an early strike when the all-effort Codi Yusuf fired the ball into the blockhole and trapped Tshepang Dithole lbw for 3.

But Proteas batsmen Sarel Erwee and Keegan Petersen were determined and focused as they added 99 for the second wicket, before Malusi Siboto drew a slip catch from Petersen (58).

While Erwee ploughed on to 75 not out off 168 balls, Marques Ackerman was able to turn a slow start into 40 undefeated runs off just 47 balls, the Lions bowlers perhaps being guilty of giving the left-hander an excess of leg-side scoring opportunities.

Yusuf finished the day with one for 37 in 13 overs and Siboto had taken one for 35 in the same number of overs.

In order to have a chance of claiming the four-day title in this final round of fixtures, the Lions have to beat the Dolphins and also get 5.74 more bonus points than them.

At the moment, the Dolphins have collected 1.62 more points than the Lions.

WP v EP

In the match between the two other teams in contention for the title, the Eastern Province Warriors batsmen feasted on the Western Province attack as they piled up 347 for nine at Newlands.

An excellent top-order display laid the foundation, with the extremely talented Jordan Hermann setting the tone with 81 up front, Diego Rosier (59) and Matthew Breetzke (52) then both scored half-centuries, and Rudi Second chipped in with 48.

FS Knights v Boland

In the other match, the Free State Knights bowled the Boland Rocks out for 212 in Paarl, and had made 99 for three in reply.

The promising Michael Copeland led the way for Boland with 55, while veteran off-spinner Aubrey Swanepoel took five for 67 in 24.4 overs for the Knights.

Opener Matthew Kleinveldt was the mainstay of the Free State reply, with 50 not out.

The second Test between South Africa and the West Indies may have only lasted three-and-a-half days, but in terms of advertising their self-professed love of Test cricket and their renewed happiness under new leadership, the Proteas produced a compellingly clinical display at the Wanderers on Saturday.

The West Indies were bundled out for just 106 in only 35.1 overs, their third lowest total ever against South Africa, whose 284-run winning margin was their second-biggest against the once-great Caribbean team.

Off-spinner Simon Harmer took the new ball and bowled unchanged from the Golf Course End to take three for 45 in 17.1 overs. Kagiso Rabada, as ever, had set the ball rolling with two wickets in the 11^th over, after West Indies openers Kraigg Brathwaite (18) and Tagenarine Chanderpaul (2) had initially done well to put on 21 for the first wicket.

Seven overs later, the West Indies had crashed to 34 for six at lunch, left-arm spinner Keshav Maharaj also taking two wickets.

But what happened next to Maharaj was the only negative of the fourth and final day at the Wanderers, with the 33-year-old rupturing his achilles tendon as he tried to celebrate his second wicket, an excellent review leading to Kyle Mayers being given out lbw for 7 on the stroke of lunch.

Not much more than an hour after lunch it was all over, with young fast bowler Gerald Coetzee mopping up the tail with three for 37, once again improving on his career-best figures.

“Today the guys were very clinical in the way they went about their business. Winning is always fun and I did enjoy that,” new Test coach Shukri Conrad said after debuting with a 2-0 series win. “To see smiles on the faces and a happy changeroom is fantastic, because after the Australia tour, things were very dark.

“It was great to see how the guys responded and I feel there has been a little bit of growth already. We now have to find novel ways of keeping that growth going because we don’t play another Test for nine months.

“I can say categorically and emphatically that the boys want to play Test cricket, every single one of them wants to play more Test cricket,” Conrad said.

The 55-year-old coach was especially delighted for his captain, Temba Bavuma, who must have slept well overnight having scored a magnificent 171 not out that led the Proteas from a position where they were in danger of losing the match to a massive lead.

Although Bavuma only added a single to his score on Saturday, swinging Jason Holder straight to deep backward square-leg, he has answered his critics in emphatic fashion, his long-awaited second Test century being not only a biggie, but a matchwinning one on a lively pitch.

Conrad said Bavuma’s epic had roused considerable emotion in the Proteas changeroom.

“Thank goodness the TV cameras didn’t show the changeroom because there were a few wild scenes in there,” Conrad laughed. “Temba is under a lot of pressure, often for no good reason.

“So it was a monumental knock with the Test on a knife-edge. The West Indies have found ways to crawl back into the game in this series, and we have found ways of letting them back in.

“So at eight for two and then losing another two quick wickets, we needed someone to step up and move the momentum of the series. It was both a match and series defining innings.

“It was a helluva knock against a very skilled bowling unit, especially the quicks. Technically, Temba was fantastic.

“We are all so happy for him. After close of play yesterday [Friday], some of the guys stood up and lauded Temba. After all the unnecessary stick he gets, to go out and play like that was fabulous,” Conrad said.

West Indies coach Andre Coley said his team had relaxed at key times on the third day, but he praised Bavuma for “seizing the opportunity and wrestling the game away from us”.

The bowlers then wasted no time in landing the knockout punch on Saturday, securing a win that was as emphatic as some of the big triumphs at the Wanderers in the previous decade when South Africa were one of the leaders in Test cricket.

Temba Bavuma on Friday added another seminal moment in South African cricket history, to join with his memorable maiden Test century at Newlands in 2016, as his masterful 171 not out first rescued the Proteas and then put them in firm control of the second Test against the West Indies at the Wanderers.

When the long-awaited moment of his second Test century came, one that will hopefully silence the critics who constantly bring up that statistical quirk and ignore the fact he has been South Africa’s best Test batsman for the last couple of years, it came with a flourish as he lashed fast bowler Alzarri Joseph over the covers for his 12^th four. It’s a bit like refusing to rate Jacques Kallis as a great batsman before he scored a Test double-hundred.

Even though the third-day crowd at the Wanderers was small, the joy was obvious, especially in the commentary boxes where former Black African players like Makhaya Ntini, Mfuneko Ngam and Nono Pongolo celebrated with a passion that showed just how special and important Bavuma is for the majority of this country.

Those commentary boxes are in the Charles Fortune Media Centre, and one wonders how the doyen of South African radio commentary would have described the moment as Bavuma went to 100 in 254 minutes, off 192 balls. Perhaps the great John Arlott would have been better suited to capture the moment, given that he once wrote “human” on a South African customs form asking him what race he belonged to back in the dark days of Apartheid.

As usual, after he had led the Proteas from a parlous eight for two to 287 for seven at stumps, leading by 356, Bavuma had to field questions both about what happened on the field on Friday and the wider significance his exploits will have for society as a whole.

“It’s been a long journey with a lot more downs than ups,” he stated. “But I keep learning about myself, the type of person and cricketer that I am. I try and keep my chin up and always stay true to myself.

“That Temba who scored the hundred at Newlands was very young and naïve, I was ignorant to what was going on around me and the pressures and challenges of playing international cricket.

“Making it against the West Indies is sentimental and makes it even more special because I used to support them as a child. It’s also important because it’s about inspiring the next generation, allowing much more Black African batters to dream and come through and etch their name in the record books.

“There’s always that angle and perspective to everything I do. I’m sure young Temba would be very proud of this Temba today,” Bavuma said.

But the 32-year-old Bavuma made it clear that his motivation and satisfaction on Friday night had more to do with rescuing his team than reaching individual milestones, no matter how sought after they have been.

This was the sort of Wanderers pitch on which anyone who dares to chase runs is likely to come short and many of Bavuma’s team-mates were guilty of going too hard. Dean Elgar (5) and Tony de Zorzi (1) both fell looking to score off deliveries they would have been better off leaving.

Aiden Markram (18) hung around with Bavuma and tried to steady the ship, but Kemar Roach had Markram caught behind with a superb delivery.

Ryan Rickelton (10) and Heinrich Klaasen (14) were then both lured into loose strokes and South Africa were 103 for five, leading by just 172.

Even with the hot sun beating down on the pitch, there were still plenty of embers of life in the surface, but Bavuma, diminutive but standing tall as a giant, doused the West Indian attack. Staying compact and not chasing after deliveries outside the stumps, leaving well and putting away anything on his pads, Bavuma played one of the great pressure knocks in a Proteas second innings in recent times.

Wiaan Mulder dug deep and scored an invaluable 42 as he added 103 for the sixth wicket with Bavuma; Simon Harmer then contributed 19 runs, but more usefully, added another 71 with his captain.

Bavuma made it to stumps having batted for more than six hours and faced 275 deliveries, stroking 20 fours.

“It’s a key point that the team was in trouble. I always seem to find myself in these situations when I really have to try and soak up pressure, absorb and release,” Bavuma said. “I’ve done it well in the past, but without getting really big scores, and my game kinda leans towards that.

“It was a very important partnership with Wiaan, I tried to calm him down by saying he had nothing to prove because he’s done it before for the Lions and in county cricket.

“We had good synergy and the partnership with Simon was also important. It’s about the team and we are in a lot stronger position now.

“My mindset was just to stick to what I was doing. Getting a hundred was not the objective, it was getting to the end of the day’s play. It was more mentally tiring than physically, but the adrenaline kept me going,” Bavuma said.

The new South African Test captain is far too polite to publicly rub his many critics’ faces in his success, but he did say there was one monkey he now has off his back.

“I’ve never scored a first-class hundred at the Wanderers before and the guys always tease me about that, my name not being up on the honours board. I’m pleased I can stick it to them now,” a satisfied Bavuma said with a glint in his eye.

The skipper, a hero to so many in this country, produced a truly heroic performance of which he can be most proud. What a pity that with so many good things happening around this Proteas Test team, their next outing is only in December.

The new-look Proteas bowling attack was running through the West Indies batting line-up like a freight train on the second day of the second Test at the Wanderers, but then they were derailed by the tall, athletic figure of one Jason Holder.

With South Africa’s batting collapse from the first afternoon carrying over into Thursday morning as their last three wickets were snapped up in just three overs, their total of 320 seemed a long way out of the tourists’ reach as the West Indies struggled to 116 for six when Holder came to the crease.

He had wicketkeeper Josh da Silva for company initially, and they survived for 40 minutes up to tea and then took their partnership to 41 afterwards, before Da Silva was deceived and bowled for 26 by a quicker delivery from off-spinner Simon Harmer.

Alzarri Joseph (4) fell soon afterwards to South Africa’s other spinner, Keshav Maharaj, and at 162 for eight, with the West Indies’ deficit a sizeable 158, Holder made his move.

Together with Kemar Roach, who had a six and a four in his 13, 31 was added in 25 minutes for the ninth wicket, but when fast bowler Gerald Coetzee had Roach caught in the slips in his first over back, the Proteas were no doubt contemplating an hour or so of batting to build on a lead that was still 127 at that stage.

But the heroic Holder found an ideal sidekick in last man Gudakesh Motie, who may have been batting number 11 but looked organised from the outset and has a first-class century against Barbados to his name.

Their brilliant last-wicket stand of 58 defied and frustrated the Proteas as Holder went on the attack against the spinners, hitting three more sixes and ensuring the West Indies conceded a much more manageable deficit of just 69.

The agony was finally ended by Harmer, whose quicker ball led to the dismissal of Motie for 17, with three well-struck fours, as he tried to swing the off-spinner leg-side but could only sky a catch into the covers.

Holder was left on 81 not out, his first half-century against South Africa and his 12^th fifty in his 62^nd Test. It was a great effort by the former captain, who said afterwards that individual milestones were not his focus, but rather serving the team.

“I love playing for this group and I try and play every situation the best I can for the team,” Holder said. “My job was to form partnerships, try and get in and then go big. It was a good innings I guess with wickets falling around me.

“Being able to shepherd the tail was special. Josh was pretty poised, we made a good start up to tea and we just had a simple plan to keep going.

“When Motie came in, the deficit was still more than a hundred and I just needed him to get in. I took most of the strike until he got accustomed and then we just tried to take every run we could. He did an outstanding job,” Holder said.

South Africa were playing two frontline spinners at the Wanderers for the first time since 1965, but Maharaj and Harmer did not have a major impact, although a second-day pitch was probably always going to be when they had the least assistance.

Both shipping runs at 3.6 per over as the West Indies tried to attack them while the going was good, Harmer took two for 63 and Maharaj one for 77.

The most effective bowlers were Kagiso Rabada, who lived up to his massive reputation, even though Holder thought he had a niggle, taking two for 19 in 12 overs, with five maidens; and young Coetzee, who is looming as a considerable talent.

The 22-year-old, playing in his second Test, took a career-best three for 41 in 14 overs.

“Coming into a world-class bowling attack, it’s been very easy for me. I’ve been able to fit right in because I have the freedom to just do my thing,” Coetzee said.

“The pitch for my first Test at Centurion was more bowler-friendly; this one, if you bowled well you would get reward, but if you don’t bowl well then you will go for runs.

“Jason batted very well and it’s tough to deal with any fifty partnership for the last wicket. But a 70-run lead is better than a 70-run deficit,” Coetzee said.

South Africa stretched that lead to 73 by stumps as openers Dean Elgar and Aiden Markram survived three overs and scored four without loss. A Proteas team that the West Indies have described as being top-heavy will look to plough on through the third day and whatever surprises the pitch has in store for them.