Temba Bavuma fell on the stroke of lunch in the morning session on day four, after England set the Proteas 380 for victory at Old Trafford.
Despite losing Elgar and Kuhn early on, Temba Bavuma and Hashim Amla were heading towards hanging on until lunch and survive the difficult 19 remaining overs in the session after the rain disappeared, but their task of chasing down the unrealistic target has now become that much more difficult, after Toby Roland-Jones removed Bavuma on the last ball before lunch with a feather of an edge.
As expected, Broad and James Anderson asked plenty of questions as they got the ball to cut corners off the surface, as well as getting the ball to swing late in overcast conditions. It’s ironic then, that the ball to get out Elgar actually held its line. Elgar, so used to seeing the ball move away from him, was forced to play at a straight one from Broad, and he found the edge behind to walk back for eight.
Kuhn was hanging in there, but only just as he survived an England review after the slip cordon thought he’d edged one when he was on five. Kuhn, hamstring problem and all, started to feel more comfortable on the off-side against Anderson, but then that confidence got the better of him as he played one away from his body, handing Alastair Cook catching practice at first slip.
The Proteas did what they set out to do when they strode out on day four, needing to restrict the Moeen Ali onslaught and limit the number of runs they needed to chase down. Moeen could only add eight runs to his overnight 67, as Morne Morkel dealt with the tail. Stuart Broad flashed one to Theunis de Bruyn at point to depart for five, and two overs later Morkel had his fourth as Anderson popped one up to De Bruyn once more, this time at short-leg. Moeen was left stranded on 75.
Only 19 runs were added to the overnight total for England to be bowled out for 243, with Morkel taking well-deserved figures of 4-41.
After the openers walked back to the pavilion, Amla battled hard as he took 18 balls to get off the mark. But he soon got into his rhythm and clipped the ball off his pads nicely. Bavuma looked his organised self, that was until the last ball of the session. A half-hearted appeal from the slips and Roland-Jones fell on deaf ears from the umpire. Joe Root decided to appeal it and sure enough snicko showed the tiniest of edges.
Bavuma was gone for 12, and although Amla is still there on 11, the 340 more runs required look a long way away. Amla and Faf du Plessis will go into the second session with their side struggling on 40-3.
Photo: Oli Scarff/Getty Images
