South Africa provide reminder of how Test cricket can be revived

High into an azure sky off the Cape Peninsula a yellow sun beat down with fiery intensity. Sizzling in the Summer heat were a few white pearls throwing and hitting a leathery ball about in the shadow of Table Mountain. At the summit of this country’s emblematic landmark one can only gaze five towering structures encircling Newlands. From this altitude the game of cricket looks like any other: it’s simplistic, atavistic nature in the sport’s most charming arena. A vista unlike any other, and a series many a South African would have, until recently, only been able to envisage through some wild, maddening dream.

A contest deserving of spectators, destitute it was of public applause and voice as Temba Bavuma inched to his right, dropped on one knee as he swept Ravichandran Ashwin savagely large and true toward the square leg boundary: one bounce, two bounce, four. Bavuma jabbed the warm air repeatedly before hurriedly embracing his batting partner Rassie van der Dussen like an excited child hugging their parent in the playground after school. This series is at an end, Virat Kohli’s tenure as India’s captain is at an end, as his side walked off the sumptuous sun-kissed turf solemnly, glumly, humbled.

Now, it must be cited that South Africa’s last streak of Tests were played six months (and a few days) prior to that first Kagiso Rabada delivery at Centurion on Boxing Day. India would hand the Proteas a 113-run defeat. The Proteas fruitless in their clumsy efforts to slap 200 on the gaudy scoreboard in either innings as Mohammed Shami slices through the willow in the twinkling of a surprised eye. Yet there was to be a turning of the Mozambique Current: Dean Elgar laying the siege with the bat in a seven-wicket win. Not even Shardul Thakur’s BBI of 7-61 could prevent such Indian blues.

Transition to this recent Friday where a similarly deserted arena witnessed a pair of sparkling Keegan Peterson performances to aid a once bereft-of-belief camp to a Series victory over the number one ranked Test side in the world. Laudable stuff, and this newly nourished South Africa side served as a reminder to how the purest format of the game should be executed: willingness to endure, the striking synergy between players and coaches and, above all else, a genuine quality this nation now possesses in all the shiny levels of this speedily developing department store.

But it was not exclusively the chunky D&P bat of Petersen which glistened in the sunlight that this tour will be remembered for. Lolloping in the direction of the crease was the imposing, moody figure of Marco Jansen, whose nineteen wickets were bettered only by the twenty taken by his ally Rabada. In between the scarce smiles Jansen bowled metronomically and at an imperious height, too. That was to be the defining factor, the chalice of impending doom. As a collective the host’s pace bowling attack was seven inches taller than their Indian counterparts, equating to an average of close to 20cm more bounce. That’s a lot. Just ask Jasprit Bumrah.

And then, some six-thousand-and-a-bit miles of mostly ocean east towards a distant continent, England were showing everyone how not to play. In a startling contrast this is a Test playing nation who appeared to leave their defibrillator at home. With each passing wearing of their creamy whites this side slid deeper into the darkening entropy. Brisbane, Adelaide, Melbourne, Hobart - all landslide sweeps for an Australian outfit smelling blood, only the elements preserving an even more ignominious 5-0 whitewash. It was ugly, it was listless and, quite frankly, a waste of everyone’s time and (lack of) sleep.

We throw vitriol towards sportspeople on a regular basis, often needlessly. Over in cricket’s other Southern Hemisphere coliseums England’s futility jabbed a syringe of realisation into the veins of its followers. Plenty has been made of this and, no matter what Jonathan Agnew or Chris Silverwood may assert, suggest, beseech…no radical supporter of cricket can truly hold the key to the shimmering lock of national success. Maybe let’s just start with a re-shuffle of the schedule? Just an idea…

South Africa dominated a bloodless Indian batting cohort who, after their very first innings total of 327, failed to score above 266 in five ensuing attempts. A remarkable turnaround for a team who in recent years have given a disjointed impression both on the field and in the offices that hang above. Through apartheid, Cronje, disputes over player welfare and prejudice this cricketing nation have taken many a piercing to the heart; swept up into the eye of a hurricane before being spat out, landing poetically back onto its feet. No clearer was this image portrayed by the unbridled joy that stuck to Elgar’s face at the series end, and the emotion it splashed onto a canvas so delicately and beautifully sketched.

Will it be with a sudden waft of the winds that Joe Root and his gauzy friends return to the England of old? Probably not. But look to Mark Boucher’s Proteas for inspiration, for a slither of promise to cherish until this decaying squad slips through the sands into the widening unknown as the hourglass that holds the key to our very future in Test cricket is slammed royally hard against the table of Lord’s Long Room.