Sport
-
Cricket
The Langer-Hayden show continues...
By Malcolm Conn
SYDNEY, JAN. 2. Matthew Hayden and Justin Langer began this Test season as an unlikely opening combination and are ending it as more unlikely heroes, rewriting 125 years of history in a single summer with another double century stand to further deflate a divided South Africa on the opening day of the third and
final Test here on Wednesday.
They added 219 in four hours, the fourth time they had reached 200 in just 10 innings at the top of the order together, before South Africa claimed some late wickets to have Australia at 308 for five at stumps.
Hayden was out for 105 scored in four hours from 198 balls with 14 fours and a six, his third century in as many Tests and fourth for the summer, while Langer 126 (211 balls, 19 fours and one six) made his fifth hundred in seven matches since that shock recall at the end of the Ashes tour.
Their performances have produced an amazing set of numbers. There is only one other opening combination, amongst the hundreds who have began innings together through 1582 Tests who have managed as many as four double century opening stands, and it took West Indians Gordon Greenidge and Desmond Haynes a cricketing life-time to achieve it. Greenidge and Haynes batted together 148 times over 12 years.
Last night Langer was still struggling to comprehend how far he had travelled since those dark days in England. ``It's a bit surreal to be honest,'' he said. ``If you had asked me in the middle of the England tour if I would be feeling like I am now I'd think you were crazy.''
The productivity of Hayden and Langer, once considered battlers in a team of pedigrees, continues to overflow. Less than a week after becoming the greatest run scorer for Australia in a calendar year, Hayden is now the first player to pass 700 runs in an Australian season for more than a quarter of a century. His 705 runs at 78.33 bettered Greg Chappell's 702 against the West Indies in a six-Test series during 1975-76.
It is little more than four months since Langer's career hung in limbo after being dropped but he has gorged himself since returning in place of Michael Slater for what initially appeared a temporary disciplinary measure.
Langer has since made 757 runs in the seven Tests at 84.11, while Slater, who was himself involved in four double- century opening stands - three with Mark Taylor and one with Greg Blewett - is now struggling to make runs for New South Wales.
Colour or credential?
Already two Tests down, South Africa's fragile mental state was compounded by the political divisions which have made a mockery of team selection and left an unholy mess for the tourists to try and clean up before Australia arrives next month for a return three-Test series.
Not for the first time in South Africa's history, colour was put ahead of credentials and in the post apartheid era that meant Justin Ontong made his Test debut because he added colour to an almost all-white team.
That the raw 21-year-old was caught behind off Stuart MacGill twice without scoring at the same venue during a tour match against New South Wales just a fortnight ago seemed to make no difference to United Cricket Board of South Africa's president Percy Sonn and the other officials who overruled the selection panel.
Ontong played in place of Klusener and ahead of the more deserving Jacques Rudolph, while Nantie Hayward, South Africa's quickest and most inspiring bowler in Melbourne, was dumped to make way for spinner Nicky Boje.
It was a bizarre sight at tea when, with Australia 215 for no loss, Hayward became part of the organised entertainment during the break, throwing a vortex with selected punters from the crowd.
Langer said the South Africans were flat in the field. However, he believes it was not so much politics but the prospect of batting last against leg-spinners Shane Warne and MacGill, who was preferred to Andy Bichel in Australia's only change.
Hayden was eventually caught at slip edging the persistent Shaun Pollock, easily South Africa's best bowler, prompting another middle-order wobble.
Ricky Ponting (14) was run out after a tight call from Langer, who was then caught bat-pad at silly point off Boje. Rushed into the side after arriving in Sydney the day before the game, Boje showed no sign of the knee injury which had hindered him and highlighted how much he had been missed by clearly out- bowling fellow left-arm spinner Claude Henderson.
The day ended with another modest performance from the Waugh brothers when the 36-year-olds were again thrust in against the second new ball. Steve was bowled for 30 by a Pollock off- cutter which found a surprising gap while Mark (19) was caught behind waving lazily at the last ball of the day from Allan Donald.
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Sport
|
