It could be challenging for Markram and Bavuma on Friday night. South Africa is now just 69 runs away from winning a world championship thanks to their 143-run stand. South Africa! In opposition to Australia!
In Ahmedabad, hundreds are killed when a jet crashes out of the sky. Israel strikes Iran, frightening millions and killing a number of people. It’s Friday the 13th, and worrying about cricket alone feels incredibly pointless.
Nevertheless, we were present at Lord’s for the third day of the WTC final between Australia and South Africa, alive and well. Life continues with an eerie and brutal inevitability even in the midst of death and ruin. Cricket does, too.
When Ryan Rickelton roared around the boundary in front of the Mound Stand, chasing for a delivery from Marco Jansen that had squirted off the edge of Josh Hazlewood’s bat towards deep third, there was something both sad and heartless about it.
The morning was breathtakingly gorgeous, and it was the eighth over. The icy yoghurt sky that had welcomed the first two days of the match were replaced with a pale blue that was distinctly English and only slightly tempered by distant clouds.
As he ran, Rickelton, a ferocious, busy fielder, dropped his cap, his arms and legs nearly creating vapour trails in the hot, humid air. When he dove, the ball was as far away from the cushion as his forearm. It’s too late. Another four runs.
Rickelton jogged back to his fielding position on the point boundary, flipped his cap into the air, caught it, and jammed the front of his boot into it. A man who understood that he had a mountain to climb—one that would only become higher—made the gesture.
The Australians resumed with a lead of 218 and two wickets remaining, and that was the second of seven fours they hit. Kagiso Rabada took nine wickets in the match after the first was taken with the 16th ball of the day, which struck Nathan Lyon hard in front of the leg stump.
The second was not grabbed as quickly. In a stand that lasted 14 minutes shy of two hours, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood shared 59 runs off 135 (Starc scored 53 of them). South Africa won 282 after Hazlewood shovelled a long-hop from Aiden Markram into the hands of cover at the stroke of noon.
A team has only scored more runs to secure victory once in the 39 Lord’s Tests that have been won by the team batting fourth. However, that was in June 1984, and they had Gordon Greenidge, who easily defeated the West Indies’ target of 342 with nine wickets remaining with an unbroken 214 off 242. Imagine having that many and not needing the assistance of Jeff Dujon, Clive Lloyd, or Viv Richards—all of whom were on the XI.
That is not how a contemporary squad is constructed. Not even in Australia. To think that on Thursday, they had been 73/7. And so when the lead was 216, they would have been three balls before stumps, nine down. However, when Starc edged Wiaan Mulder, Jansen couldn’t hold on because he was standing too near to Gully in a cordon that drew closer and closer as the edges kept failing. Rather, nearly two-thirds of Australia’s total was scored by their final three pairs, all of which featured Starc.
However, that was to idly speculate about what may have been. After two days of favouring the seam bowlers, but not excessively, the South Africans were better off thinking about what was in front of them: a wicket that was ideal for batting.
When Rickelton drove weakly at a full ball from Starc, the thirteenth of the innings, and was taken behind, it would have caused a stir in the home dressing room, where the South Africans are stationed.
Mulder, one of the match’s two improvised No. 3s, walked to the middle. In the first innings, he was like a black hole at the crease, taking in everything, making no noise, and hitting six off forty-four in almost an hour. This time, however, Mulder discovered his footwork and his ambition, proving that there is a brain and some gumption in that black hole. When a delivery from Starc appeared to stand up in the pitch and Mulder’s drive reached the ball a nanosecond before he had intended, he had already firmly established himself. South Africa was 70/2 when he spooned a catch to cover.
Their most recent example occurred at the WACA in December 2008, when Graeme Smith, Hashim Amla, Jacques Kallis, Makhaya Ntini, and Dale Steyn outperformed their XI. Prior to that, they had won five Test matches by scoring more than their target in this match. That team is not this one.
Prior to Friday, Temba Bavuma has batted 109 times for South Africa in Test matches.
He had followed that path both in good and bad times, and he had produced the goods with remarkable regularity. It was neither nice nor awful this time. But that was a huge struggle.
The match had yielded just three scores of fifty or more, and nothing higher than Beau Webster’s seventy-two in the first innings, despite the surface having flattened. Steve Smith and Webster put up 79 runs in the same innings, the largest of the four half-century stands. Not to mention that three of the world’s top five bowlers are part of Australia’s attack.
In the sixth over before tea, Starc, who isn’t with them at the moment, found the edge of Bavuma’s bat. At first slip, the ball sailed hard to Steve Smith before hitting the ground. Smith instantly sought for medical assistance after collapsing in agony. He was rushed to the hospital after leaving the pitch with a bone protruding from his right little finger and chewing his shirt. A “compound dislocation” was the diagnosis made.
Bavuma, who was eight not out at the time, was hit hard by a single to midwicket in Starc’s subsequent delivery. He appeared rigid all of a sudden, yet he made his ground with ease. His left hamstring was soon being treated by the medics on the pitch, and he shuffled between the wickets when he started to bat again.
After 15 balls, tea arrived, and Bavuma found it difficult to run for the first 20 minutes of the third session. But over time, the kinks in his gait were worked out, and he started running freely. At the opposite end, Markram was a rock of consistency, demonstrating his unwavering resolve in every action.
Early in the second hour of the match, Bavuma scored his half-century off a single wide of slip against Lyon. Markram hit a clipped four through midwicket off Hazlewood to reach his century seven balls before stumping. He lifted his bat, took off his helmet, and wiped away his tears.
Sometimes you don’t get the runs even though you look good. Sometimes the runs come even though you don’t look well. Sometimes you don’t look as well as you believe you do, and you question why you don’t get the runs. You rarely score as many runs as you believe you do and bat as well as you appear.
On Friday, Markram had that unique and uncommon emotion at Lord’s. It’s no surprise that his feelings overcame his self-control. By the end, he hadn’t entirely composed himself, so he turned down a TV interview. He jumped the steps to the dressing room two at a time after entering the protection of cricket’s most opulent pavilion. Bavuma moved cautiously, gently, and cautiously behind.
Take a moment to process that. Then, before you have to take guard once more in the morning, try to get some sleep. For the time being, however, Friday the 13th remains the luckiest day of the year.
India
