South Africa v India tests - Jan 2018

[mikesiva]

Philander strikes again. Parthiv out for 16.

[meninblue]

Lead by 14. 9 wickets left. Need a partnership of 40 runs from these 2.

[meninblue]

Both Vijay and Rahul nearing a 2 digit score. Improved signs.

[meninblue]

Lead by 24. Need 158 more to be favorites imo.

[meninblue]

4 more. Edge welcomed .

29 runs lead. 9 wickets intact. Looks better now.

[meninblue]

Nice drive by Vijay for couple of runs.

[meninblue]

Lungi into the attack in 14th over.

[meninblue]

Well driven by Rahul down the ground for 4. Lead nearing 40's.

[meninblue]

Lead by 42 with 9 wickets still intact. We have batted very well. India hold advantage imo. SA need to bowl better tomorrow and pick wickets unless we will put a match winning score on the scoreboard.

[andy]

Only saw last 40 mins, why on earth did Parthiv open? Also is there an injury to Rahane?

[Dr Cricket]

Strategic move Andy.
Kind off worked with him putting the new bowlers off their lines a bit.

India in pole position here, anything over 150 should be very difficult to chase here.

[Arthur Crabtree]

The day started favouring SA but it being difficult to say by how much. And ends favouring India. But again, if the pitch is going to flatten out like greentops often do, it's difficult to say by how much.

[Dr Cricket]

Doubt this will flatten though.
You seen the uneven bounce and indent on the 6-8 m area, good luck batsman.
The point is Arthur this is a green top and a dry cracked surface.
Green top is gone, now the dry cracked surface is coming to play.
You basically got the ball moving in 4 direction in top of the extra swing Johannesburg get, hard to see how any batsman scores runs here.
The cricinfo summery tells it all, batting is a lottery and will get tougher as the games goes on, Kohli and the Indian team read the pitch correctly at the toss.

[Arthur Crabtree]

OK then, advantage India.

Still have to post 130+ though.

[Dr Cricket]

Alan Donald said the pitch is a disgrace enough said far too many saying the pitch won’t flatten out if anything most saying it will get worse.
This pitch should really get reported not because of the seam movement or grass or the greeness of it but for the overly dried surface and cracks.
It really shouldn’t have cracks opening up on day 2 and dangerous variable bounce this early in a test match.
You can’t really have a game when people said 180 on first innings is good for a lead or on this green top the winning the toss honestly thought it was easier to bat on day 1 and not on day 5.

You can’t really use the excuse of the batting been bad as well considering we saw 4 or 5 really good knocks, 3-4 of them century quality knocks on another day pujara, Kohli and amla would all get hundreds, rabada, bhuvi and philander batted well.