Ken Borland

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Graeme Smith showed that his head was still cool, calm and collected when he won the toss and elected to bat first amid all the hype and hullabaloo at the Wanderers on Friday morning.

Smith was celebrating his 32^nd birthday and also the momentous milestone of becoming the first cricketer to play 100 Tests as captain, so Johannesburg, his place of birth, was  abuzz with tributes and Biff-mania.

There was a great sense of expectation that the world’s number one side would honour their magnificent leader by blowing Pakistan away at the Bullring and the pitch was sporting enough grass for many to back the idea of unleashing the potent South African pace attack.

But Smith, courageously and unselfishly, saw the cracks already present and reckoned it would be preferable to bat out a tough opening session rather than have to bat last.

It was the correct decision for the team, despite Smith, as an opening batsman, having to come out and face the music straight away.

The left-hander was by no means on top of his game, but he and Alviro Petersen added 46 for the first wicket as they saw off the new ball in the first hour-and-a-half. South Africa were on their way and, even though Smith (24) and Petersen (20) fell within five balls of each other before lunch, Hashim Amla and Jacques Kallis put the hosts back on top as they carried them to 125 for two midway through the afternoon session.

But the South African batsmen seemed to have other matters on their minds – could they have been distracted by all the Smith hype? – and they frittered away their remaining eight wickets for just 128 runs, nothwithstanding a 64-run fifth-wicket stand between AB de Villiers and Faf du Plessis.

It was a similar experience for a Wanderers crowd of just under 10 000 on Friday to the much-anticipated Test against Australia in 2011 when South Africa, 1-0 in the two-match series, won the toss, batted first and were bowled out for 266 in just 71 overs on the first day by an attack that was one man short. South Africa were 122 for two and 241 for four on that day, and a less cavalier attitude would have seen them score at least 400 and shut Australia out of a series they went on to share.

After De Villiers and Du Plessis fell just before the second new ball was due, Dean Elgar was left alone with the tail and when he tickled off-spinner Mohammad Hafeez down the leg-side into the gloves of impressive wicketkeeper Sarfraz Ahmed, the off-spinner was able to run through the lower-order and finish with a career-best four for 16.

Lady Luck had not smiled on the left-hander and she was also blamed for the dismissal of Du Plessis, who felt that the delivery that he had played on to his stumps from Junaid Khan had kept low.

But there was no doubting South Africa’s batsmen had put on a distracted, unfocused display, while Pakistan were disciplined with the ball, brilliant in the field and thoroughly deserved their success.

“From 199 for four, we should have got more and there was not enough from the bottom six, but it was quite tough for batsmen coming in. We were looking for 320 as par, but when AB and myself were together we thought we could get 350 which would have been very good. We got ourselves in position … ” Du Plessis said.

To get only 253 was a particularly poor effort when one considers everyone in the top seven made at least 20, but Kallis was the top-scorer with just 50. Smith and Kallis both played badly-executed shots, although Asad Shafiq, who had to make considerable ground around the leg-side boundary, took a fine catch to dismiss the latter.

Everything Pakistan captain Misbah ul-Haq touched turned to gold on Friday and even part-time medium-pacer Younis Khan was able to make a crucial breakthrough when he removed Amla for 37, thanks to Azhar Ali hanging on to a screamer at gully.

The current Proteas management fobs off criticism of their decision to make De Villiers keep wicket and play a specialist batsman at seven, but there is a hint that the policy is engendering a rather devil-may-care attitude amongst the top-order. With so many batsmen, there seems to be a feeling that someone else can finish the job if I score a breezy 40, much like the 90 for five syndrome in the 1990s when South Africa had tremendous batting depth with Shaun Pollock, Lance Klusener and Nicky Boje in the lower-order.

Pakistan openers Hafeez and Nasir Jamshed fended off an over apiece from Vernon Philander and Dale Steyn at the end of the day and the South African attack will need to strike early on the second morning if they are make up for an off-colour display by their batsmen.

Questions will be asked as to just how mentally sharp South Africa were on the opening day and it is difficult to shrug off the feeling that they were distracted by all the hype around Smith. Hopefully the Proteas can return to their clinical best on Saturday and ensure Smith has a suitable celebration.

There was no lack of intensity from South Africa on the second day as they reached stumps on 86 for one in the first Test against England at the Oval in London on Friday.

Having rebounded superbly with the ball, claiming England’s last seven wickets for 118 runs to bowl them out for 385, Graeme Smith and Hashim Amla ensured there were no further alarms after the early loss of Alviro Petersen for a duck as they batted South Africa through to the close.

Both batsmen looked as solid as concrete against a probing English attack that was eventually backing off and setting defensive fields. Smith, playing his 100th Test, finished the day on 37 not out off 118 balls, with four fours, while Amla was on 47 not out, off 97 deliveries, with six fours.

South Africa’s bowlers had given little evidence of their passion and desire on the first day, when Alastair Cook cruised to a century and took England to 267 for three at the close of play.

But when Vernon Philander began troubling Cook from the outset, it was clear that England’s batsmen would not have nearly as easy a ride as on the first day.

It was Dale Steyn who sparked the South African comeback when he removed Cook for 115 and Ravi Bopara for a duck in successive overs.

Cook’s footwork was still sluggish when he went hard at a drive off Steyn and, when the ball swung back in nicely, it found the inside edge and cannoned into the stumps. The left-hander had played many fine strokes in collecting 11 fours and a six (his leaves were also impressive!) and his 295-ball innings was a mighty effort to give England an early head-start in the highly-anticipated series.

The unfortunate Bopara, still trying to cement his place in the side, tried to pull out of a hook shot at the fired-up Steyn, but withdrew the bat too late, the edge going through to wicketkeeper AB de Villiers.

Philander had been the perfect foil at the other end, just eight runs coming from the five overs he bowled at the start of the day, and he was unlucky not to get the reward for beating the bat several times. The introduction of Jacques Kallis saw the pressure on England increase if nothing else, as the great all-rounder’s first four overs were all maidens and he picked up the key wicket of Ian Bell (13).

PUGNACIOUS PRIOR

Bell, seeing the ball swinging away nicely, was then bemused as he left a delivery which swung in and just clipped the off-bail, causing it to topple and the in-form 30-year-old was bowled.

Matt Prior’s wicket was the one that really mattered though.

Even though South Africa were on top at lunch, leggie Imran Tahir spinning out Tim Bresnan, who dragged the ball into his own stumps, for eight to leave England on 326 for seven, Prior prospered in the afternoon.

South Africa’s bowlers were guilty of losing a bit of focus and there were enough bad balls for Prior to hammer nine fours and breeze to 60 off 90 balls. Early on he had been like a man stumbling in the dark without a lamp, and England’s innings could have been truly wrecked if a couple of half-chances had been taken.

He was reprieved when Petersen made a great save in the slips but couldn’t throw down the stumps with both batsmen in the middle of the wicket, and Jacques Rudolph dropped a sharp catch, lunging low to his right in the gully, off Morne Morkel when Prior had 17.

South Africa will rue those lapses, but will be happy they limited the dangerous Stuart Broad to just 16 as he was bowled by a tremendous Philander delivery that he had little hope of keeping out – from over the wicket, the ball came back miles to bowl the left-hander through the gate – and that Morkel wrapped up the innings with two wickets in the 126th over.

Prior’s pugnacious innings off 60 off 90 balls came to an end when he edged an expansive drive away from his body to De Villiers, and Jimmy Anderson (2) joined him back in the pavilion four balls later when he flapped at a leg-side, short-pitched delivery from Morkel, the catch behind giving the wicketkeeper five in the innings.

Morkel did not have the best of days with the ball, overdoing the short delivery, but his final figures of 4-72 were a just reward for his efforts on the first day.

Steyn had, crucially, recaptured his mojo in the morning, but his poor spell after lunch left him with figures of 2-99 in 30 overs. Kallis was also superb and his figures of 2-38 in 19 overs underestimate his value, his wickets being the key ones of Bell and Kevin Pietersen, and both at crucial times.

Philander again worked well in partnership with Steyn (perhaps they should have been used together more on the first day) and deserved better figures than 1-79 in 27 overs.

England had 11 overs to strike back with the new ball before tea and Anderson managed to get his 10th ball to go like a boomerang, swinging back into Petersen and hitting him on the back leg to trap him lbw for a duck.

But Amla was a grimly determined Smith’s able co-pilot as they negotiated the best England could throw at them, and a 106-minute rain delay straight after tea, to ensure South Africa go into the third day on even terms.

http://www.supersport.com/cricket/sa-team/news/120720/No_lack_of_intensity_by_SA_on_2nd_day