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Basil
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Injured Morkel unable to bowl in rest of match
South Africa fast bowler Morne Morkel will not be able to bowl anymore in the ongoing Test against India, after suffering an ankle ligament injury just before lunch on the third day at the Wanderers. His participation in the second Test is also in doubt, with team manager Mohammad Moosajee saying a grade one ligament injury usually takes seven to ten days to heal.
Morkel's unavailability has left South Africa in a dire position in the first Test: India's lead was 67 when he hobbled off before lunch and they had extended it beyond 250 with eight wickets in hand by the time the severity of the injury was confirmed. He will bat in South Africa's second innings only if absolutely necessary.
Morkel fell while fielding in the over before lunch and appeared to have twisted his right ankle when his foot got stuck in the turf as he ran around from fine leg to collect a ball. He managed to throw the ball back to the wicketkeeper but then went down, clutching his ankle. South Africa's captain, Graeme Smith, was at his side immediately and one of the fielders called for a stretcher, but after the physiotherapist Brandon Jackson arrived on the field, Morkel was able to walk off, helped by bowling coach Allan Donald.
Morkel had bowled only two overs in the second innings before he was injured. He had been South Africa's most impressive bowler in India's first innings, taking three wickets and generating steep bounce. By the end of the first session on the third day, India had reached 31 for 1, extending their lead to 67 runs.
The second Test in Durban begins on December 26.
hya
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Can Kallis make a U-turn?
He may have hit one of the roughest patches in his career, but Jacques Kallis, in the past, has shown he can recover spectacularly
At Mark Boucher's tribute dinner recently, he wished his best friend Jacques Kallis "best of luck for the next 20 years of your international cricket career". Amid laughter Kallis responded he would either stop enjoying it or stop contributing if he keeps playing to offer some reassurance to the audience. Those people may revisit that evening and wonder what Kallis thinks about that quip now.
A golden duck at the Wanderers - only the second of his career - is not a reason to condemn the man widely acknowledged as the best cricketer South Africa has ever produced to retirement. But because it's part of a streak in which he has only gone into double figures only once in the last six Test innings, it is an indication of something worrying.
Kallis has had the leanest Test year in 2013, for years in which he has played more than one match. In seven Tests, he's managed only 160 runs at an average of 16.00. He has not scored a century for the first time in a calendar year since 1997. In the three years preceding this one, he has averaged over 50.00.
More alarming than the sudden dip will be the manner in which he has been dismissed. In the five of his last six Test innings, including today Kallis has been out lbw to deliveries that have come into him, even if only slightly. On every occasion, he has played across the line and been late on the shot.
No example of that was clearer than today. Ishant, having bowled Hashim Amla the ball before, follow-up perfectly. He kept it full and directed it straight. Kallis looked a little slow on the shot, played across and knew he was out as soon as the ball struck the pad.
The method of dismissal could be a reflection of Kallis battling to judge the line quickly enough or simply a sign that he is short on confidence early on in his innings. As one of the most technically correct batsman around, it's likelier it is the second. That would not be too surprising considering the year Kallis has had.
He has been betwixt and between in terms of how he wants to manage what he admits are the twilight years of his career. Having said he wants to play one-day cricket, with the eventual aim of turning in the 2015 World Cup, Kallis initially made himself available for the Champions Trophy. He withdrew on the eve of the squad announcement citing a need for a break.
Since then, he has recommitted to the ODI team but his comeback has not been as successful as he would have liked. After being absent from the fifty-over squad for 19 months from March 2012, he scored a half-century on his comeback against Pakistan, but managed just 26 runs in the three innings after that.
South Africa rested him as soon as the series against both Pakistan and India were decided. While missing out on the Pakistan game with the series lost appeared a genuine attempt in managing Kallis workload, leaving him out of the India game could have been the selectors way of kindly nudging him to the exit sign in that format.
But if Kallis' career needs clipping, that should be the extent for now because Kallis still has plenty to offer in the longest format. He has had lean patches in Tests before - most recently at the end of 2011 when he scored just one half-century in seven innings - and recovered spectacularly. So there is reason to believe he will do it again.
Then, there were also concerns about his reaction times as well, particularly because he was being peppered with short balls by a young, quick Australian pack. Matters came to a head when Kallis recorded his first pair against Sri Lanka in Durban, some said his shelf life was over. Kallis responded with a double hundred in Cape Town and centuries on all three of the tours that followed.
The fourth visit - to the UAE a year later - did not bring the same success. With three single-figure scores and no wickets, statistically Kallis had the worst outing of his career. When Graeme Smith was asked if it was cause for concern, he brushed it off, adamant that the desire to continue playing at the highest level was still high for Kallis. No-one can doubt the hunger remains and the second innings may be the perfect opportunity to begin satiating the appetite.
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Zaheer makes the hard climb back to the top
Zaheer Khan has shown over the past year that he cherishes his India Test spot enough to make any sacrifice to regain it, and the work he did in that period - on his fitness and his bowling - has paid rich dividends for him and his team in Johannesburg
On December 6 last year, Zaheer Khan bowled 16 innocuous overs in Kolkata, in a Test in which England went on to take the series lead. He also had to be hidden in the field. At the end of that day, Trevor Penney, the fielding coach of the team, faced the press. He was asked pointedly about Zaheer, particularly his lack of preparation to field as the bowler ran in. Penney didn't have many answers. It was clear even he didn't believe what he said: Zaheer was back to his best and he was fully fit.
The real answer came three days later. Zaheer was dropped. The message was loud and clear: if we are losing, we may as well lose with younger and fitter cricketers, especially in the bowling department. Zaheer was 34 then, notorious for being undercooked on comebacks and with a history of fitness-related issues. Things looked really bleak for Zaheer, especially with India winning their next series, against Australia, without him.
It would have been a sad end for a bowler as crafty as Zaheer had he bowled a bit in domestic cricket and faded away as an IPL star. Many an India quick has gone down that route. Zaheer, though, had fought his body for too long to not know the value of Test cricket. He put everything else aside, went on a long fitness programme that involved visits to Brive-La-Gaillarde and Bloemfontein, and came back and played in Shimoga and Hubli to prove his fitness. More nondescript venues followed. When his friend Sachin Tendulkar was playing his final series, Zaheer was plotting a way back at Sector 16 Stadium in Chandigarh and at Bandra Kurla Complex near Tendulkar's old house. The fire was there, it was acknowledged by the selectors, but they didn't pick him right away; they made him wait, told him he needed the Indian Test team more than the Indian Test team needed him.
The Indian Test team did need Zaheer, though. His guile, his experience, his fight, his cheek. And what a comeback it has been. He began with a 10-over first spell - split down the middle by the lunch break - of difficult questions for the South Africa top order. The pace remained up all through that spell. This was exactly what India needed after they had lost their last five wickets for 16 runs in the morning. Graeme Smith, for whom Zaheer said he need but turn up, was dropped on 19 during that spell. It was the belief, though, that that spell was still important during a period when India's 280 had started to look meagre. For the first time in two years, Zaheer bowled more than 20 overs in a day. And these were high-quality overs, the last one as intense as the first.
The Zaheer threat was comprehensive. He got the ball to seam away from the right-hand batsmen, but cast the doubt with the few deliveries that went the other away. Smith never looked comfortable against him although he scored a fifty, and though his average of 31 against Zaheer - an opening batsman against an opening bowler - is not as bad as it is made out to be. The way he drew Smith across, inch by inch, making him play deliveries he wouldn't usually have tried to, and then trapping him in front with one that was full and straight, showed a sharp cricket brain at work. Zaheer also went round the stumps against the right-hand batsmen, consistently getting the ball to move away from them.
Zaheer was helped along by the two young quicks, who produced two double-breakthroughs, but by stumps on day one, India were facing a familiar problem: the thorny tail on overseas tours. It had happened so many times in the recent past that another such instance could not be ruled out even on this pitch. A catch was dropped, 67 had been added by Vernon philander and Faf du Plessis by stumps, and the game was in the balance. Philander began the next day with two boundaries. Bang, bang. That is usually the time India spread fields and wait for things to happen.
Once again, though, Zaheer put his hand up, and produced a beauty to get Philander. From round the stumps, angled in towards off, holding its line against the angle and taking the edge. He produced an even better delivery for du Plessis. A set of length balls outside off, moving away against the angle, was broken up by one that went with the angle so that du Plessis couldn't keep leaving them alone. Then, finally, he followed one, and edged it as it straightened.
In the process, Zaheer showed he cherished those 88 caps and 295 Test wickets so much he was prepared to make any sacrifice to add to them. He is now just one short of becoming only the second Indian quick to have taken 300 wickets. That is a big achievement for someone who plays on those Indian tracks, but these numbers still don't do justice to his contribution as a bowler and a mentor.
There was a nice moment after Zaheer bowled Morne Morkel with a yorker to end the innings. The rest of the team had left the field, but Zaheer waited for those two quick-bowling pals of his. Ishant and Shami had been fielding in deep positions and had lagged behind, but Zaheer went back to put an arm around them and walk off together. He probably wouldn't have known that this was the first time since Cape Town 2010-11 that India's quicks had taken all 10 wickets, but he would have felt that they had done something special.
They will know, though, that that can't be a one-off if they are to win this Test. They - especially Zaheer who has had the fitness cloud hanging over him - will also need to replicate this intensity over this year and the next - when India complete this tour, they tour New Zealand, England and Australia. If he reaches 100 Tests along the way, it will be a great achievement for Zaheer.
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