Faf du Plessis would not have been playing in this Test were it not for
JP Duminy hurting his Achilles tendon at the Gabba. And just as Duminy
did on debut in Perth four years ago,
du Plessis has grabbed his first chance at Test cricket to provide a
remarkable result for the South Africans. At the WACA it was a
near-record chase of 414 for victory; this time South Africa's challenge
was to bat for four and a half sessions on a wearing Adelaide Oval
pitch to salvage a draw.
Thanks to du Plessis, they did so. Thanks to du Plessis, the scoreline
remains at 0-0 heading into the decider in Perth, despite Australia
having had the best of the first two Tests. And thanks to du Plessis,
Australia's bowlers will have only four days to recover from some
serious exhaustion, especially Peter Siddle, who sent down 63.5 overs
for the match and was so debilitated by the time he bowled the final
over of the match that he could barely stand up.
Of course, it wasn't all down to du Plessis. Early in the day, AB de
Villiers played against type to score 33 from 220 balls without a
boundary. Jacques Kallis again fought off his hamstring strain to
provide important support in a 110-ball innings of 46. And Dale Steyn,
Rory Kleinveldt and Morne Morkel did just enough to ensure that the
No.11, Imran Tahir, would not be required. For South Africa, who will
lose the No.1 Test ranking if Australia take the series, it was a draw
that felt like a win.
For Michael Clarke and his men, it was an opportunity missed. There
wasn't a lot more the Australians could have done, especially with James
Pattinson's injury leaving them a bowler short throughout the fourth
innings. But there were some half-chances that they were unable to take,
the kind of tiny openings that on a day like this must not be wasted.
An Australian victory was still possible until the final over of the
last hour of the match.
By that stage, Siddle looked as if he'd just run a marathon. Somehow, he
kept running in and his pace barely dropped, but Morkel was good enough
to block out the over, which left South Africa on 8 for 248 when stumps
was called. The score was irrelevant to the South Africans, who had
given up on the chase of 430 on the fourth afternoon. Wickets were all
that mattered. And a couple of breakthroughs in the final 40 minutes
kept the contest alive.
Steyn fell for a 28-ball duck when he chipped an inswinging full toss
from Siddle to midwicket, where Rob Quiney snapped up a sharp catch. And
Kleinveldt survived for 17 deliveries before he missed a yorker and was
bowled by Siddle for 3. In the end, Siddle finished with 4 for 65 from
33 overes, but his herculean effort was more than matched by du Plessis,
who ended up unbeaten on 110 from 376 balls. For any batsman, it would
have been a magnificent innings; for a debutant, it was preposterously
good.
Most notable was the fact that du Plessis did not become overawed by the
situation. He spent an eternity in the nineties but was not flustered,
the team goal of survival overshadowing his own ambitions. When he
eventually pushed two runs through cover off Ben Hilfenhaus and became
the fourth South African to score a century on Test debut, after Andrew
Hudson, Jacques Rudolph and Alviro Petersen, he acknowledged the
applause and then settled straight back down to continue his job.
The milestone took him 310 deliveries, but he was far from stagnant. He
played his shots when the opportunity arose and finished with 14
boundaries. He was as calm as Duminy had been back in 2008; in fact, his
effort was much more impressive because the conditions were tougher and
nobody else in the line-up managed so much as a half-century. The
Australians thought they had du Plessis twice in the first session, only
to be denied on review.
Both came off the bowling of Clarke, who drew positive lbw calls from
Billy Bowden when du Plessis had 33 and again on 37. The first time, the
batsman's review showed the ball had pitched a fraction outside leg
stump; the second time it revealed that the two noises Bowden had heard
were bat on ball and bat on ground - the ball had not even struck du
Plessis on the foot or pad.
The Australians also used up their final review shortly before lunch
when du Plessis, on 49, offered no shot to a Nathan Lyon delivery that
pitched and struck him outside the line of off stump but was turning
enough to interest Clarke. However, Eagle Eye suggested the ball would
have bounced over the top of the stumps, and Clarke was left to consider
how he would find six wickets in two sessions with no further reviews
available.
In the last over before tea, they had a chance when du Plessis edged
Hilfenhaus and Matthew Wade, standing up to the stumps, couldn't grasp
the catch. Ed Cowan also put down a tough chance at short leg in the
final session when Steyn clipped Siddle off his pads and the ball flew
low to the ground, and they were the kind of opportunities the
Australians couldn't afford to miss.
Cowan did complete a much easier catch in close when Lyon, who bowled 50
overs in the innings and 94 for the match, drew an inside edge onto pad
from Kallis that popped up to short leg. Kallis had made 46 and given
his injury, his effort was just as critical as that of du Plessis. De
Villiers also played a key role until he was bowled by Siddle for a
laborious 33 from 220 deliveries, an innings that did not include a
boundary and was second only to Chris Tavare's effort at Madras in 1982 in terms of the lowest strike-rate for an innings of at least 30 runs in Test history.
De Villiers was happy defending and that was all South Africa really
needed. They also required someone to stick around for the whole day,
and du Plessis obliged. For the first time since 1921, Australia and
South Africa had played out two consecutive draws. And for the second
time this series, Australia saw a potential victory evade them. It all
comes down to Perth.
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