South Africa took a slight lead on Day 2 of the 1st Test against India which saw Dean Elgar scoring a century and a debut half-century from David Bedingham at Centurion.
The Proteas got the early wickets they intended to in the morning session on Day 2, but not without allowing KL Rahul to reach his consecutive century at Centurion.
Coetzee picked up the wicket of Siraj, but it was the wicket of Rahul that was the crucial one.
India got to 245 when Burger bowled a beautiful in-swinger to remove the inform Rahul for 101.
South Africa needed to survive the rest of the first session in conditions that favoured the Indian bowlers perfectly.
The visitors got the desired start, Markram out for five, Siraj finding a late swing that snicked the outside edge of his forward defensive block.
Dean Elgar and Tony de Zorzi survived until lunch, posting 49-1.
After lunch, the roller did its job to even out the wicket a bit. The surface was a little easier to bat on although two quick wickets were taken by India – De Zorzi for 28 and Keegan Petersen for 2.
A solid partnership by Elgar and Debutant David Bedingham (32*) got South Africa back on track.
This was also the session where a fairytale was written, Elgar (111*) scoring his 14th career century in his final game at Centurion.
By tea, South Africa had their total at 194-3 trailing India by 51, in a session where 145 runs were scored in 33 overs at a 4.39 run rate.
After tea, South Africa went into the lead. Elgar continued to rack up runs, but the session’s highlight was Bedingham reaching his debut half-century. Unfortunately, he lost his wicket on 56 off 87 balls with SA trailing by 1 run.
Kyle Verreynne came to the crease and played a beautiful cover drive to take his side into the lead. That’s all he managed before he played a loose shot away from his body and was dismissed. SA were reduced to 249-5.
Elgar ended on 140 off 211 runs, with SA on 256-5 and a lead of 11 as bad light stopped play.