India to Fight back in second Test South Africa 269/6

India to Fight back in second Test  South Africa 269/6

After all the talk of the pace and bounce of the Highveld, Centurion ended up providing India the most subcontinental conditions they could have expected on this tour. The skies were blue, the pitch was brown, and R Ashwin bowled the bulk of India's overs.

That could have been the extent of India feeling at home. For the first 80.4 overs of the day, South Africa's batsmen had pitched a tent, pinned family photographs onto the canvas, and made this flat, friendly surface their home. Aiden Markram had fallen narrowly short of a hundred, but Hashim Amla looked all set to stroll past that milestone, and South Africa were 246 for 3.

And then, Centurion 2018 turned into Kolkata 2010. Amla and Alviro Petersen had scored centuries that day, only for South Africa to collapse from 218 for 1 to 296 all out, in a typically Eden Gardens post-tea collapse.

Here, South Africa lost three wickets for the addition of five runs, two of them to run-outs, and India, out of nowhere, were back in the game. They hardly deserved to be: Ashwin and Ishant Sharma apart, their frontline bowlers had been poor.

Source: espncricinfo.com