South Africa All Out, Referrals Not Convincing

England dismissed South Africa for 418 in their first innings of the first Test at Centurion, in what is warming into a nicely balanced contest.

The tourists will be fairly happy with their display. The bowlers worked hard for their ten wickets,  Graeme Swann the pick of the bunch with 5 for 110.

For the hosts, Jacques Kallis stroked a chanceless hundred and there were decent contributions from Ashwell Prince, JP Duminy and Mark Boucher – but none made enough runs to take the game away from England.

The one contentious issue has been the new referral system. On day one it worked splendidly, giving reprieve to Prince and AB De Villiers.

But, on day two, Graeme Swann trapped Morne Morkel on the crease and everyone – umpire Steve Davies included – thought it was a straight forward decision.

Hawkeye, however, disagreed and Morkel was given another life. From every angle I saw, it looked as plum as an lbw can be.

If the system is there to make Test cricket better – and it needs something given the terrible crowd at Supersport Park – I’m not sure this system is it.

Watching Morkel, a hulk of a man, prod around for an extra half hour, blocking and nudging, is not going to turn anyone’s eye from Twenty20.

As if batsmen need any more help in this day and age; bigger bats and smaller boundries, now coupled with some extra lives, spells a dark era for the world’s bowlers.

England Struggle in Final Warm-up

England’s final warm-up for their South African tour curtain-raiser on Friday ended with a hammering. The tourists – at near full-strength – were rolled over for just 89 in 17.3 overs of the Twenty20 match with a decent South Africa ‘A’ side.
Alastair Cook was the only batsman to pass 20, despite England fielding a strong batting line-up – Sajid Mahmood, who knows which end of the bat to hold, was last-man-in.
Graeme Swann and Adil Rashid picked up a couple of wickets each with the ball, but England eventually lost by four wickets.