Pretoria: India A were on the back-foot as they ended the second day of the second unofficial Test against South Africa at 145/6 on Sunday. Earlier, Indian bowlers allowed the Proteas to post a match-winning total of 341 in their first innings.
Though, India A skipper Chetashwar Pujara score a half-century, but Beuran Hendricks made the difference with his left-arm pace bowling as he dismissed three top-order batsmen to give his side an upper-hand in this contest.
India did had a decent start as Pujara was looking quite solid with his approach. But after his departure, India were ripped apart as they lost four more wickets in a very quick time.
Ambati Rayudu remained unbeaten on 14 whereas Pervez Rasool hasn’t opened his account till yet. India A still needs 47 runs to avoid the follow-on.
India lost five wickets in the span of 50 runs after they were placed quite comfortably at 95. Hendricks gave couple of blows to give Indian team a scare before the tea and thereafter the visitors struck with their spinners.
Players who were given the opportunity to prove their mettle couldn’t make any kind of impact. Dinesh Karthik blew off his opportunity as he departed after scoring just nine runs and very soon Stuart Binny followed his footsteps and got out without making any contribution to the team’s total. Both the dismissals were claimed by the off-break bowler Simon Harmer, who ended the day with the figures of 2/43.
Murali Vijay was the first to go as Hendricks caught him in front of the stumps while he was trying to play across and was given leg before wicket at four. Rahane and Pujara did try to knit the partnership for the second wicket and were looking quite solid with their steady approach. But after Pujara’s dismissal, tables turned in favour of Proteas. Pujara’s 54 were studded with five fours which came off the 97 balls that he faced.
Wriddhiman Saha (14) was left rattled by the pace of Kyle Abbott whereas Rahane was undone by Hendricks whose angle did the trick again and he got his man who was looking good at 36 off 82 balls. Rahane smashed five fours in his innings.
Earlier, South Africa managed to surpass the 300 mark as Wayne Parnell and Simon Harmer scored 91 and 96 respectively.
Starting the day at 231 for six, Parnell and Harmer continued frustrating the Indian bowlers and it took the Indians 18 overs more to break this partnership. Nadeem took the wicket of Harmer at the score of 283 and in his very next over he dismissed Kyle Abbott. Very soon, Parnell’s resistance came to an end and there was a golden chance to restrict South Africa A under 300 runs but India squandered it as Andrew Birch (44, 58 balls, 8x4) added 50 runs for the last wicket with Hendricks (10) to take the score closer to 350.