Ken Borland

Chasing down 305 in the last innings on a SuperSport Park pitch offering variable bounce and plenty of movement will remain a quixotic prospect for South Africa as they struggled to stumps with four wickets down on the fourth day of the first Test at Centurion on Wednesday.

Led by captain Dean Elgar’s defiant 52 not out, the Proteas closed on 94/4, which leaves them with 211 runs still to get on the final day for an unlikely victory. No team has ever reached 300 in the fourth innings of a Test at SuperSport Park.

Elgar has been at the crease for more than three hours, facing 122 deliveries, and has been unfazed by the many times he has been beaten, or struck on the body. He and a similarly phlegmatic Rassie van der Dussen (11) spent 102 minutes together defying the conditions and the venomous Indian attack, lifting the hopes of the home team and their supporters.

But India’s spearhead, Jasprit Bumrah, returned to the attack five overs before the close and struck a vital blow with just his fourth delivery. Van der Dussen misjudged a leave and Bumrah, who has been bringing the ball back sharply so often in this Test, slanted the delivery straight into off stump.

Nightwatchman Keshav Maharaj was then showing his mettle with the bat to reach 8 with just two balls remaining in the day when Bumrah cleaned him up with a tremendous yorker into the base of leg-stump.

South Africa have also lost the wickets of Aiden Markram (1), who was also trying to leave the ball but withdrew his bat too late and bottom-edged Mohammed Shami into his stumps, and Keegan Petersen (17), who was beaten by some late away movement by Mohammed Siraj and caught behind the wicket.

India’s batsmen were also exposed to the whole gamut of difficulties posed by the surface in their second innings, being bowled out for just 174 in 50.3 overs.

Opener and first-innings centurion Lokesh Rahul (23) and Cheteshwar Pujara (16) batted time and both survived for nearly two hours before both fell to Lungi Ngidi (10-2-31-2).

Ajinkya Rahane (20) and Rishabh Pant (34) decided attack was the way to go and both scored at around a run-a-ball, as did Ravichandran Ashwin (14) in a 35-run seventh-wicket stand with Pant.

Their positive approach threatened to really take the lead far beyond South Africa’s reach, but Kagiso Rabada returned to wrap up the tail and finish with 4/42 in 17 hard-working overs.

Marco Jansen completed a satisfactory debut with 4/55 in 13.3 overs.

The players union gets involved in Proteas matters when the team as a whole is affected by an issue and that’s exactly why the South African Cricketers’ Association have been offering their support to the squad over the last 24 hours in the wake of the Quinton de Kock ‘taking a knee’ controversy, CEO Andrew Breetzke said on Wednesday.

De Kock withdrew from the Proteas’ T20 World Cup match against the West Indies a couple of hours before the start after Cricket South Africa issued a directive on the morning of the game instructing all players to take a knee in support of Black Livers Matter.

While CSA are awaiting a report from team management before deciding on what action to take, and De Kock spent Wednesday with agent Dave Rundle crafting a statement to explain his actions, SACA have been actively involved in protecting the interests of the team as a whole.

“It’s a complex and complicated scenario and our focus has been on supporting the team over the last 24 hours,” Breetzke told The Citizen on Wednesday. “But we’ve engaged with Quinton a lot too.

“The timing of CSA’s directive has been destructive to the team environment at the World Cup. While SACA would have preferred a unified team stance on taking the knee, the players’ stance has not changed in 12 months.

“So this directive by the CSA Board should have been made before the World Cup and not during the tournament. The timing of the directive is the problem for the players. We always seem to have issues at world cups,” Breetzke said.

Although the players have not been able to come up with a unified response to supporting BLM, Breetzke said “This current Proteas team has had more culture camps and discussions about diversity under Temba Bavuma than any other Proteas side.”

While the cricketing world eagerly awaits De Kock’s explanation for the stance he took, the fallout has continued with unconfirmed reports from India saying his IPL franchise, the Mumbai Indians, will not be re-engaging his services at the next auction. But after a fairly average last season for them, they might have been looking to move on anyway from a big earner with a reported $500 000 contract.

The Big Bash League in Australia has, however, already put out the welcome mat for De Kock should he no longer be playing for the Proteas this summer.

“We encourage our players to think about the issues and express their views as they see appropriate,” Cricket Victoria CEO Nick Cummins told The Daily Telegraph in Australia.

“We would certainly be interested in a player of his calibre to come to the BBL. It would be great for the competition.”