56th over: South Africa 144-4 (Markram 58, Mulder 27) Suddenly, runs! And from Hazlewood, the last one you’d expect. Too full to begin, and Mulder nails a cover drive, perfect execution. Then the line is wrong and he almost gets another four, this one to fine leg, where only a very good Starc save in a tangle of limbs keeps him to two. And Hazlewood makes another error, leg side again, this time pinging off the thigh pad to the rope for leg byes. It never makes sense that a leg bye like that, purely from bowler error, doesn’t go against the bowler. That’s 11 from the over, though only 7 of them credited as going against Hazlewood.
On Renshaw earlier, John Starbuck ponders. “Cricket, perhaps more than most other sports, can stand or fall by the dictum of doing what your opponent least expects. Obviously, it doesn’t always pay off, but it might explain why Australia have begun the day like this.”
I think that’s true… up to a point. Your opponent doesn’t expect you to bowl 20 overs of slow head-high full tosses, but it’s not to your advantage if you do. Didn’t mind one over of Renshaw at the start, but before batters are settled you surely want your best operators testing them.
55th over: South Africa 133-4 (Markram 57, Mulder 21) Cummins so close! This pitch is not a home for demons, but there’s still some bounce for the right delivery, and this one takes off. Decent length, sharp bounce past the shoulder of the blade, Mulder pushing at it but totally flummoxed by the zing. Maiden over.
54th over: South Africa 133-4 (Markram 57, Mulder 21) Hazlewood really putting in some effort here, you can hear the grunt through the stump mics. He’s shaping the ball slightly, too, swinging away from Mulder. Normally only a very subtle swinger of the ball, if at all. Hazlewood relies on seam movement. Bouncer to Mulder, down under it. Mulder has not been sucked into any Stubbs-style shots. Finally scurries a single.
53rd over: South Africa 132-4 (Markram 57, Mulder 20) Cummins works away at the top of off stump. Bowls a no ball, which is unusual for the Australian captain. Mulder knocks a run to point. He’s still having some trouble with that shoulder that he hurt yesterday, landing heavily on it while fielding on the boundary.
52nd over: South Africa 130-4 (Markram 57, Mulder 19) Indeed, Hazlewood has now swung around to the far end. He’s giving Markram a good long stare after a leave just outside the off stump. A couple of singles, the pull and the glance. The pitch doesn’t look too hard to play on, but a couple of balls have done something. The Australians are sweating on that one variation that will draw a mistake in their favour.
51st over: South Africa 128-4 (Markram 56, Mulder 18) Now Cummins replacing Hazlewood! What’s going on? Cummins does like to rotate bowlers, but Hazlewood looked good. Maybe just changing ends. Good over from Cummins, anyway, beating Mulder’s edge and forcing him under a bouncer. Nothing scored.
50th over: South Africa 128-4 (Markram 56, Mulder 18) Singles from Lyon.
“What mind game is the OBO playing by displaying the score as 120-1 when 4 wickets are down?” asks Krishnamoorthy. “Does that give SA a better chance?”
On It is the ancient mind game known as manual scorelines, which means that one typo in a source post can be copy-pasted across multiple posts before anyone notices. Hot tip to all if you do notice an error on the OBO – how rare those days must be! – first try refreshing your page. It may have already been corrected, but that won’t be visible until you reload.
49th over: South Africa 125-4 (Markram 55, Mulder 16) Here’s the quick change from Cummins: three overs from Starc, looking out of sorts, and he’s replaced by Hazlewood. Who immediately beats the edge! Third ball of the over. Markram is furious with himself. He sees width and can’t help driving, but the length isn’t there, not full enough. Big whooshing drive, it misses, and Markram’s bat swishes like the tail of an annoyed cat.
Two balls later, nearly bowled! My word, that ball jags back in and misses the off stump by a centimetre. Markram left it, and was watching with heart in mouth.
Last ball of the over, driven straight for four. This one is full enough, and straighter, and Markram will allow himself to play that shot and not be self-castigated for it.
Great contest.
48th over: South Africa 120-4 (Markram 51, Mulder 15) Lyon again suggesting that he’ll be threat. Big turn into the pads, one ball gets squeezed past short leg by Mulder.
47th over: South Africa 119-4 (Markram 51, Mulder 14) Starc still isn’t getting the radar into that threatening zone. Goes off side, goes leg side, easy enough to leave a lot balls. A couple of singles from the over, a couple more wides. Starc was the destroyer eventually in that 2018 match, with the ball reversing.
Half century! Markram 50 from 129 balls
46th over: South Africa 116-4 (Markram 50, Mulder 13) Now we’ll have Lyon. Immediately he gets bite from the pitch, operating over the wicket to begin with. Then tries for width to turn back in, and Mulder drives that well! Powerfully through cover, but Webster is sweeping out there, and slides in on his knees like Elvis, lateral to the path of the ball, to tap it back before the toes of his huge boots clip the rope. Two runs, then a single. Lyon gives Markram an easy short ball to end the over, cut for one to bring up the batter’s minor milestone.
The Durban Test last time Australia visited was Markram’s first, and he scored an incredible hundred on debut in the fourth innings, chasing a big score. South Africa were never quite close enough to the target to think that they would win, but if he’d made another 60 they might have… can he make history repeat with a century today, and keep them in the game?
45th over: South Africa 112-4 (Markram 49, Mulder 10) Some more wild stuff from Starc across the right-hander. We’ve spent so much time in this match watching left-handers bat, it now feels weird when both batters are the conventional way. No run from the over, Markram leaves alone a lot of it.
44th over: South Africa 112-4 (Markram 49, Mulder 10) Markram gets to face his first ball of the day, and soon enough he’s easing the ball through square for two, then another one. Hot hand and all, but I’m not convinced by starting a Test day with Renshaw. Surely you go to your best bowlers, your best options, not the guy who had momentum yesterday afternoon. Lyon will be more danger to a batter starting their day afresh.
43rd over: South Africa 109-4 (Markram 46, Mulder 10) Renshaw gets taken for a respectful single, but Starc gets clipped for four first ball of the day! This is a strange world. There’s a wide in there as well, on the off side. Starc has bowled some wild balls in this Test, a tendency that he had earlier in his career, but had fixed up in the last few years with adjustments to his technique. Not sure what’s gone on the last few days.
42nd over: South Africa 105-4 (Markram 46, Mulder 6) And it’s not a bad first over, either. So Renshaw will bowl spin ahead of Nathan Lyon this morning? That is curious. Mulder sees it out, and carefully drives the last ball for one.
We begin, and… first over of the day goes to Renshaw?!
Word from the ground is that Steve Smith did the warm-ups, so that’s good. He got a head knock from Anrich Nortje while batting yesterday, so they kept him from fielding as a concussion precaution.
(The revolution will be delayed for bad light.)
“10 quality dot points!” comes the praise from Nick Jones. “A communication guide would have it at four, or even three for the 1-2-3 A-B-C crowd. But a shining ten, a ten of great quality and weight. And none requiring a sub bullet. C’mon Aussie c’mon.”
Thank you, Nick. I consider mine to be in the vein of freeform jazz improvisational dot points. We are telling a story in dots, riding a river of dots. What are newspaper photographs if not images conveyed in a torrent of tiny dots, their force made evident only when they join together as one? Join together, people! Rise up!
The predicted sun is not really in evidence yet, I should add.
The weather! Tell us about the weather. The projected high is 25 in the good money, Doctor Fahrenheit’s monster is not welcome here. The forecast says sunny and pleasant… until 3pm. Then thick clouds are predicted to roll in, and we’ll probably be off again for the light.
You want the match report with a side dash of analysis? Well, do I have the cricket writer for you. Enjoy the word of some guy.
Preamble
It’s the final countdown. Australia have bossed Renshaw’s Match so far, but it still has the slender chance to become Markram’s Match. He’s still there, that’s why. Here is the equation, in dot point form:
South Africa need 319 further runs on the last day to win.
That’s unlikely.
One of the reasons it’s unlikely is that they are already four wickets down.
Aiden Markram and Wiaan Mulder are good, but they don’t have enough backup to take on a chase that size.
Therefore Australia need six wickets to win.
But cricket has another option. Sometimes neither team wins.
If South Africa can bat 90 overs, they’ll draw.
But it probably doesn’t have to be 90 overs.
Bad light has stopped play early throughout this Test.
So, it could be drawn in 60 overs, or 70, or 80.
What does all this mean? Still plenty to play for. Australia should win it, that’s what probability says, but the South Africans have pulled out some amazing defensive efforts in various fourth innings over the years. Either option is still plausible.
