Sport

England still in control

By Ted Corbett

PORT ELIZABETH, DEC. 19. For all South Africa's magnificent comeback England still keeps control of the first Test even though a titanic struggle continued throughout the third day. Tomorrow it will expect success from the slow left arm spin of Ashley Giles who bowled defensively in the first innings, made 26 vital runs at No.8 and who will surely relish the turning pitch. He had Jacques Rudolph caught at 64 and almost had Graeme Smith, the captain, twice four overs from time but South Africa finished 11 runs ahead with eight wickets standing.

Today, when it might have made a South African victory impossible it tossed aside its best opportunities to score heavily and instead owed its total of 425 and a lead of 88 to a workmanlike 79 from Mark Butcher, and a vigorous contribution from the last two batsmen Simon Jones and Steve Harmison.

Expectations

Those walking into Sahara Park, St. Georges, as the old ground is now known, for the third day of the first Test were convinced that England would run up a huge score on such a brightly promising holiday week-end; that Andrew Strauss would score the 17 runs he needed to pass the England highest score here by George Mann in 1948; that South Africa was quite out of the game. They could hardly have been more wrong.

The first suggestion came crashing to the ground when Strauss, an immaculate batsmen on the second day was out in the fourth over to the first of a series of shots that have no place in a text book and caught at backward point trying to cut Shaun Pollock. Michael Vaughan, the England captain, came and went in 14 balls that included a six, uppercut over the slips three balls before he was caught in exactly the way Graeme Smith had mimed after his six. Graham Thorpe who often begins a series badly was bowled sweeping Smith after 29 balls spent gathering four runs and at that point — 267 for four — it began to look as if the lead was not just 70 runs away but over the hill and too far away.

While his three team mates had been squandering their opportunities to cash in on an attack that relied so much on the part time off-spin of Smith, Mark Butcher was batting in that tidy, orthodox, careful way of his. He was hardly setting the nearby sea on fire but when he was joined by the dynamic Andrew Flintoff three quarters of an hour before lunch he deserved a medal for his restraint. He went to fifty in the last over before lunch at 299 for four with a punched four through the covers; rather more dramatically, but in perfect accord with his character, Flintoff hit a six in the same over from Andrew Hall.

Bad shots

If bad shots were contagious they became a plague after lunch when Butcher, Flintoff, Geraint Jones and Matthew Hoggard were out in 15

balls for just 12 runs; all to strokes from the Tuesday evening league although they were inspired by a tigerish spell from Makaya Ntini, who throughout the innings has made the ball spurt from a length. Ashley Giles steadied the boat until just after tea while Simon Jones who arrived to find five slips awaiting him blocked an end as they added 31 for the eighth wicket.

Jones was dropped by Ntini at deep fine leg but Steve Harmison hit Dale Steyn for six and four and Pollock for a four and two twos so that the England lead grew to 88 because the last two wickets added 57, another sign of the difference between of the sides. England has grown mature in the last year; South Africa was a rudderless ship at times because it had so many players lost in confusion whenever something strange happened.

To add to the two near collisions and the mix-up over a catch off a no-ball, South Africa's new opener AB de Villiers lost control of his bat which hit him on the shoulder and almost struck his wicket. Two overs later Hoggard caught him off his own bowling diving forward. South Africa was still 24 runs behind when Rudolph was caught shoulder high by Marcus Trescothick off Giles, the important bowler on a turning pitch tomorrow.

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