South Africa and England were evenly matched on day one of the third Test match, writes Ongama Gcwabe from Port Elizabeth.
The oldest cricket stadium in the country didn’t provide any luck for the Proteas captain as he lost his sixth-consecutive toss in Test cricket. Bowling first on a flat, slow wicket was always going to be tough and it was no different for the Proteas’ four pacemen.
Besides having a tough, wicket-less first session, Kagiso Rabada and Anrich Nortje gave the fans at St. George’s Park something to smile about in the second session as they picked up a wicket apiece.
With the English fans dominating the crowd in terms of attendance, their openers got off to a good start with a 70-run partnership between them. That was before Rabada took his wicket tally at St. George’s Park to 25 wickets in only five matches with the wickets of Dominic Sibley and the ‘Big Fish’ Joe Root.
The homeboy, Anrich Nortje, and Keshav Maharaj also got in on the act with the wickets of Zack Crawley and Joe Denly respectively.
The crowd numbers were not anywhere close to what we saw at Supersport Park and Newlands, but the St. George’s Brass Band entertained as we all expect.
At stumps, England were on 224-4.
Photo: Deryck Foster/BackpagePix
