Category: Cricket

Matt Renshaw declared after Australia’s strongest batting performance on this South African tour that he is neither a doctor nor a curator. But he confirmed his status as Australia’s incumbent opener and clearly remains a very loyal mate.

The mystery neck problem that forced Steve Smith out of the Cape Town Test has been revealed as what Cricket Australia is calling a cervical facet joint injury.

The International Cricket Council reprimanded and fined Pakistan fast bowler Haris Rauf on Wednesday, while also fining England for a slow over rate during a tri-series match in Lahore.

• Keepers rebuild the innings to reach 330-4 at the close

• Green sparkles but Labuschagne duck must be the end

If Cape Town’s first day was a rollercoaster, the second was some more sedate form of transport, though it continued with ups and downs fitting its mountainous backdrop. Twice, South Africa produced double strikes to stall promising Australian positions; twice the Australians rebuilt. Finally, Josh Inglis and Alex Carey pushed Australia in front, 330 for four to South Africa’s all out 329, ready to surge on through day three with those six wickets left in hand.

While Travis Head was there, Australia’s first session threatened to match South Africa’s the day before, when Aiden Markram and Marques Ackerman had piled on 140 against a bewildered attack. Head threw his hands at width, mixing luck with skill for seven boundaries. His new foil Matthew Renshaw showed contrasting temperament for the opening role, leaving and defending the new ball with the clarity he had shown in the middle order in Durban, underlining why he was the original candidate to replace Jake Weatherald at the top before the selectors’ brief and ill-fated Nic Maddinson excursion.

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Australia is in the lead at stumps on day two after a superb batting day in Cape Town where four of the visitors’ top six struck half-centuries.

Australia enjoyed a fruitful day with the bat as half-centuries from Matt Renshaw, Cameron Green, Josh Inglis and Alex Carey put the tourists ahead of the game in the deciding third Test in Cape Town.

Cameron Bancroft ended a 364-day drought with an emotional century to put Western Australia in a dominant position after Day 1 of their Sheffield Shield clash with South Australia.

A fresh report has ramped up speculation that Pat Cummins’ shock decision to bowl first in the Cape Town Test was one fuelled by emotion after Steve Smith’s withdrawal at the eleventh hour.

England’s record Test wicket-taker James Anderson was treated with disrespect when he was released by Lancashire, according to his former pace bowling partner Stuart Broad.

If Mitchell Starc had his way, Australia would wipe out everything that happened before lunch in an extraordinary opening day of the series decider against South Africa in Cape Town. But his finale will feature on highlights for a long time to come.

• Decision to bowl first looked like backfiring

• But hosts all out for 329 after being 140-0 at lunch

For a time, it was heading up there with the worst. David Gower at Leeds in 1989, when Australia topped 600 and declared. Nasser Hussain in Brisbane, 2002, when Australia were 364 for two by the end of the day. Edgbaston 2005, where England lamped 407 from 80 overs. Those were the looming comparisons for captains deciding to bowl at the toss, after Pat Cummins did the same in the third Test at Cape Town, only for South Africa’s openers to smash 140 by lunch. Yet, by day’s end, Australia had taken 10 for a further 189, Mitchell Starc destroying the tail with four wickets in six balls, 329 all out constituting a serious Australian comeback.

What a rollercoaster. The Australian setup has looked frazzled on this tour: confused player selections for the squad, then for the XIs, confused shot selection in the middle, players bouncing around the order with nightwatch duties and injury absences. Here they chose to leave out their best player from the second Test, Scott Boland, for Nathan Lyon, and were forced to leave out their best player of the last decade, Steve Smith, for Josh Inglis, as well as dropping Nic Maddinson and Beau Webster for Cameron Green and Cooper Connolly. The last time a touring Australian side made four non-disciplinary changes was in the West Indies in 1984.

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Australia were on the ropes halfway through day one against South Africa in Cape Town, but punched their way back into the fight to bring the third and deciding Test to life.

Indian opener Abhishek Sharma crunched a 35-ball century to make light work of a hefty New Zealand run chase and secure the visitors a series victory in Wellington.