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The Men in Blue finished on top as they reduced South Africa to 94/4 at stumps on Day 4, after setting a challenging target of 305 for the hosts.
South Africa are battling hard to save the Test, but they will face a daunting task if the final day’s play goes on without the expected rain interruptions. Just as they were hoping to finish the day on a high, Jasprit Bumrah produced two wickets against the run of play to give the visitors total command in pursuit of a win in Centurion for the first time in history.
Shardul Thakur, who walked in as a night-watchman on Day 3, hit a couple of boundaries, including one big six off Marco Jansen, before walking back. KL Rahul and Cheteshwar Pujara hung in the middle for a while before the former edged it to the slips, where skipper Dean Elgar picked up a brilliant catch.
This was a period when the Indians were in a dilemma on whether or not they should accelerate the scoring, or try to get a big total no matter how long it took. It looked like Pujara and Virat Kohli were going the second route, but after the skipper fell once again while chasing a wide delivery, the intent changed.
Ajinkya Rahane came in to stamp his authority and played some delightful shots, including a magnificent hook off Marco Jansen to clear the fine leg boundary. He followed it up with a couple of delightful cover drives and departed in the process of acceleration, shortly after Cheteshwar Pujara too was dismissed by Lungi Ngidi.
Rishabh Pant, who has not been in the best of form, chipped in with a stellar contribution which took India’s lead past the 300-mark. Once Pant was joined by Ravichandran Ashwin, it was evident that both players would not kick-start a rampage to get as many runs as they could. Ashwin uppishly drove his very first ball for a boundary, and Pant started taking his chances in a way he is known to do.
He came down the ground on a few occasions to Jansen and authoritatively played his shots against the other quicks. He clobbered a brilliant pull towards mid-wicket off Rabada despite both players on the leg side staying deep and was dismissed the next delivery in an attempt to slog it over long-on. He got a run-a-ball 34, which propelled India to 174 runs before getting bowled out.
Debutant Marco Jansen made his mark in the second innings, picking up four wickets. Lungi Ngidi, who picked up six wickets in the first innings, finished the game with career-best figures of 8/102.
Bumrah breaks the Proteas resilience towards the end of the day
Just the way it happened in the first innings, SA lost a wicket very early in the innings, this time in the second over to Mohammed Shami. The fast bowler who completed 200 Test wickets on Tuesday cleaned up Markram’s stumps yet again, doing a double over the talented batter.
Elgar and Keegan Petersen hung in for an hour and managed to restrict the Indians’ good work. They negotiated the odd bounce carefully and put a hefty price on their wicket. The captain took a few blows to the body but refused to give away any momentum to the fast bowlers.
Keegan Petersen’s impressive little stay, just the way it did in the first innings, came to an end abruptly, just when he was showing promise. The scoring rate came further down, with Rassie van der Dussen and Elgar determined to see off the final session without losing a wicket, and they were pretty much successful in doing so.
Elgar got the odd boundary, whilst Dussen managed to hang with imperious concentration. Indians needed a moment of magic to break this deadlock, and they got that right towards the end of the day from their talismanic Jasprit Bumrah. He castled Van der Dussen with a surprising inswinger, which the batter decided to leave, only to see it clip the top of off-stump.
With three overs remaining in the day, Elgar got to his fifty, and it seemed like the night-watch Keshav Maharaj will see the day through, but with just two more deliveries remaining in the day, it was Bumrah again getting the breakthrough, cleaning up Maharaj’s stumps with a splendid yorker.
South Africa finished at 94/4, needing 211 more to win the Test. While that looks slightly unlikely, they will be hoping for the weather forecast to come true and help them save this Test. Elgar is currently batting on 52 off 112 deliveries.
Brief scores
India 1st innings: 327 all out in 105.3 overs (Rahul 123, Agarwal 60; Ngidi 6/71)
South Africa 1st innings: 197 all out in 62.3 overs (Bavuma 52, de Kock 34; Shami 5/44)
India 2nd innings: 174 all out in 50.3 overs (Pant 34; Jansen 4/55, Rabada 4/42)
South Africa 2nd innings: 94/4 in 40.5 overs (Elgar 52*; Bumrah 2/22)
South Africa need 211 runs to win.
