adminSouth Africa shook off a week of introspection by taking two centuries off a flaccid England attack on a satisfying opening to the final Test in Centurion. Hashim Amla found his innings so untaxing that he might have made it in his sleep; Stephen Cook must have imagined every step of his so vividly that there would have been times when sleep was hard to find.
The series has been lost, South Africa are about to relinquish their No. 1 Test ranking to India, and five changes from the side that lost in Johannesburg told of the uncertainty afflicting their cricket, but they hold the upper hand here.
For Amla, a 25th Test hundred was an unburdening after a sequence of low scores which contributed to him conceding the captaincy. For Cook, the unburdening came with opportunity, a Test debut at 33, one he grasped so desirously that he became the 100th batsman to make a century on Test debut. Two — Lawrence Rowe and Yasir Hameed — even had the audacity to do it twice in the match.
Why is it that 100 Test batsmen, previously unchosen, have now trodden this path? There is often an advantage that bowlers have had no time to explore their deficiencies, but most influential of all must be the hunger that runs through their veins.
England will rue the life offered to both batsmen — Amla on 5 and Cook on 47, and both of them fixing further attention on the wicketkeeping of Jonny Bairstow — but that should not deflect from the untroubled assembly of a second-wicket stand worth 202 in 53 overs.
Both will be frustrated that they failed to cement South Africa’s authority, dismissed in identical manner, playing on, in a final session where England belatedly became attuned to their task. Amla, even at his most luxuriant, does not always concern himself with the gap between bat and pad and it was a sizeable one as he hung his bat limply against Ben Stokes. Chris Woakes silenced Cook — an indeterminate drive at a rising delivery.
Amla’s sixth Test hundred against England was replete with poised off-side drives as England’s bowlers repeatedly erred in length. Cook, too, a sober-minded sort, played with a fluency that he has not always attained during his career as he has built an image of a steady accumulator. South Africa zipped along for much of the day above four an over.
Four wickets in all in the final session, all with the old ball, gave England hope. AB de Villiers’ defensive jab at Stuart Broad flew to Joe Root at second slip, his second successive duck and the 10th time Broad has dismissed him in 14 Tests. JP Duminy, ambitiously high at No. 5 despite his recent double hundred in domestic cricket, then pulled at Moeen Ali’s offspin and was lbw to a straight one.
It was left to Temba Bavuma and Quinton de Kock to re-establish South Africa’s authority against the second new ball, their unbroken stand of 56 coming with a relaxed air that belied South Africa’s anxiety to bring their losing run to an end.
A Test debut at the ripe old age of 33 is something to take seriously. Cook was never going to regard it any other way. From the moment that Cook took guard at SuperSport Park, and despatched his first ball in Test cricket — a half volley from James Anderson — to the boundary, an air of gravitas descended upon the start of the final Test. — Cricinfo.
Online Reporter