India had earlier extinguished South Africa’s first innings for a record low total of 79 runs before being bowled out for 173 in the second innings.
Advertisement
The touring batsmen appeared clueless against the accuracy of Ashwin and Jadeja on a pitch offering variable pace and bounce for the bowlers. Morne Morkel in Nagpur, Hashim Amla in the first innings at Mohali, Murali Vijay and Cheteshwar Pujara with their old-style batting, Ravindra Jadeja here there and everywhere…
Kohli, who tasted success in his very first home Test series as captain, said all teams bank on home advantage and it is not wrong.
The visitors lost eight wickets this morning after resuming at the 11 for 2, in one and a half hours’ batting, to be bowled out for their lowest score against India – at home or overseas – beating the earlier ignominy of 84 all out in Johannesburg in December, 1996.
The Tamil Nadu off-spinner took seven wickets in the second innings to end with match figures of 12 for 98.
Jean-Paul Duminy, let off twice off Ashwin, top-scored with 35 in 65 balls before being dismissed – taken out by Mishra for his only wicket. Pacer Ishant Sharma also bowled well, helped on by the unpredictable bounce and movement offered by the uneven surface.
That left South Africa with 14 overs to bat before the close and they lost Stiann van Zyl, loosely pushing Ashwin to short cover, and nightwatchman Tahir lbw to Amit Mishra.
Even though India were made to wait for wickets, their spinners had shown the discipline to not give away runs. But the left-hander had to pay the penalty for being over-ambitious and perished while attempting a reverse sweep off Tahir.
South Africa slumped to 105-4 at lunch in its improbable chase of a 310-run victory target against India on the third day of the third test Friday. At 9/2 South Africa were in trouble. Stuart Binny was dropped to the bench and leg-spinner Amit Mishra was preferred ahead of him. He was not averse to jumping out of the crease and hit two impressive sixes over wide long-on off Jadeja.
Duminy, who was dropped by Virat Kohli at slip off Ashwin on 13, prolonged the innings with a mix of caution and aggression.
The South African camp, however, is not complaining a great deal about the pitch despite being on receiving end.
Unlike de Villiers, Amla and du Plessis trusted their defence even though they hadn’t been among the runs recently.
Kohli said his team were not bothered by the criticism over the Nagpur wicket, adding it was more important to perform well in hard conditions.
Advertisement
Now was the time for the crucial partnership, between de Villiers and Amla, the two men who have looked South Africa’s best bets in the series. Ashwin, though, remained naggingly accurate, and later in that over he bowled an offbreak that didn’t turn, took the inside edge of the defensive bat on to the pad and popped up for an easy catch.
