GUWAHATI: By the time Marco Jansen played on to end a violent 91-ball 93, he had broken at least three bats. But he had also broken a fair few Indian spirits -- the ones on the field and the ones in the stands -- during his time in the middle.
When he walked out to bat, India still had a small window of opportunity to curtail the visitors from running up a really big score. Kyle Verreynne had just been dismissed post lunch. There was nothing happening off the wicket but the spinners and the pacers had managed to show supreme control and discipline to limit run-scoring to singles and twos. It was, perhaps, a touch defensive but this was the opening they were after.
Alas, Jansen didn't get the memo. He went after everything red, round and within his swinging arc. In all, he hit six fours and seven sixes, four of those big hits coming off Ravindra Jadeja, who's usually very accurate. He has a very uncomplicated hitting style, clearing that front leg and using his levers to target the area from deep mid-wicket to long on. All seven of his maximums came in this region.
During the course of his range-hitting, the Indian fielders and bowlers went through a range of emotions. Ugh. Ouch. Damn. Oh well. Meh. Shrug. When Jansen was finally out, it had reached the point of acceptance.
KL Rahul and Yashasvi Jaiswal sprinted off the playing area for they had to get ready. The others? They were dragging themselves off the field after an experience not a lot of them have faced. In fact, since the start of 2020, this is only the third instance of a visiting team batting for over 800 deliveries in the first innings of a Test in India.
This is what leg day must feel like. Countless squats, numerous lunges and enough lactic acid in the legs to fill a small tank... name a muscle in the lower body and the fielders and pacers will have used it multiple times on Sunday. One of the things gym trainers tell their clients is never to skip leg day because of the benefits it has to overall metabolism. India would happily go back to the hotel and scrub out this day from their existence if they were given a choice.
When the day began, the hosts had some designs on using a still new ball to pick up some early wickets. Those designs were thwarted in a two-hour passage of play where nothing really happened as the visiting batters ground down the bowlers. If the two-day Ashes Test was played on fast forward, this session, it seemed, was played on 0.70 speed. Like streaming a video on 2g.
But the visitors, leading the series 1-0, knew they had to take as much time as possible from the day to give themselves the best chance of not losing the Test. That's exactly what they did. There were no risks being taken and no aerial shots as both Verreynne and Muthusamy focused on grinding (69 runs and five fours an illustration). It set the stage for Jansen's assault on a largely unsuspecting Indian fielding unit.
Rishabh Pant, in his first Test as captain, had been chirping non-stop for more than first 110 overs. He, too, was decidedly less chirpy over the last hour of the South African innings. "Everyone knows this is a very good batting wicket," Kuldeep Yadav said in the post-day press conference. "I was just trying to use angles and beat them in the drift."
Track a road: Kuldeep
Because of the first day's moisture, Yadav got a few balls to turn on Saturday. There was no sort of help off the wicket and with batters able to hit through the line and trust the bounce, they had to battle. It's why he ended up calling this strip a 'road'.
The one good thing from their perspective is the pitch has continued to stay true. Even in the last session, no ball has misbehaved. If it stays like this for at least one more day, the hosts may be able to put up a challenging first innings score to try and reduce it to a shootout over the last two days.