Summer sizzles, cricket does not

Sunday Times

TELFORD VICE, Newlands

NEWLANDS was sumptuous summer itself for much of Saturday, all candyfloss cloud and magnificent mountain embroidered by bracing breeze. But the cricket played beneath that captivating canopy was autumnal at best.

Half-centuries by Jermaine Blackwood and Faf du Plessis were not the first unfinished innings of the match and doubtless will not be the last. And while Dale Steyn has made it plain that he does not care who takes wickets as long as SA take them, he would have been happier with five rather than the four he grabbed.

It was that kind of day, heavy with hangovers and ho-hum. A large and generous crowd did not see bad cricket, but they have seen better.

At stumps, which was hastened by rain, SA - who mopped up West Indies for 329 - had advanced to 227/3, or 102 runs from parity.

“We are in a really strong position and The chance to score big runs is there,” Du Plessis said. “With AB an Hash at the crease you would like to think we would get a big score.”

Hashim Amla has an opportunity today to go where no batsman has gone in two days on a faultless batting pitch: another 45 runs and he will have a century.

AB de Villiers brooded and bided for unusually many of the 52 balls he faced. If he gets back to his brand of basics today, look out.

With proper batsmen Temba Bavuma and Stiaan van Zyl still padded up, there is good reason to believe SA will forge significantly ahead. Vernon Philander and Steyn could take them still further, and faster to boot.

SA dealt with what was left of West Indies’ innings inside the first hour. The fact that the visitors scored 53 runs off 59 deliveries suggests a waggling tail, but 35 balls covered the crash of the remaining four wickets. They were shared by Steyn and Morne Morkel.

Three of them fell through strokes best avoided. The exception was Blackwood, who missed a Steyn delivery that was headed for his leg stump and nailed his pad instead. His 56 was fashioned in almost three hours from 113 balls - the longest a Windies batsman has yet spent at the crease in this game.

The West Indies posted their second-highest first innings in 15 tests in SA after the 408 they made at St George’s Park in December, 2007. That set up their only test victory in this country, a record they are unlikely to improve on this tour.

Dean Elgar scored eight runs of the opening stand of 48 he shared with Alviro Petersen before Jason Holder speared a delivery into his pads.

Then Petersen - whose travails are recorded elsewhere on this page - put another nail in his coffin by calling for a run that was not there and paying the penalty to end the partnership at 56.

With that, SA had black holes at either end of the pitch. Amla and Faf du Plessis absorb pressure like no other players in the game, and they did that long enough to add another 53 to the total. They were parted when Du Plessis wafted at a wide one from Sulieman Benn and was stumped.

The departing black hole was replaced by a supernova, but perhaps De Villiers bumped his head on his way out of the dressingroom and forgot who and what he is.

It took him 31 balls to reach double figures - an age considering the superb conditions and the less than superb opposition. De Villiers faced seven more deliveries before gracing the ground with his first four, hit on the hoof and lofted over extra cover off Benn.

De Villiers added three more boundaries before the close, and looked more like a man cleared for take-off with each blow. Amla has not swung for the fences with any of the last 24 balls he faced, which have brought him just eight runs. Amla and De Villiers have put 70 on the board. There would seem to be plenty more where those came from.

What do you do if you are West Indies? Attack De Villiers and defend against Amla, or the other way round?

That question swept down the mountain with the veil of rain that brought a grim end to proceedings and told everyone that summer was over, at least for the day.

Or, as Du Plessis said as he headed for the team bus, “Movie night, guys.”