England's seamers edge the first day

Daniel Brigham at Lord's

England kept a tentative grip on their No.1 status in the Test rankings after restricting South Africa to 262 for 7 with a mixed bowling display. But the hold could have been even tighter after a blistering start.

After taking four wickets in the morning session South Africa crawled back into the game with three successive fifty partnerships. Jacques Rudolph (42) and JP Duminy (61) played patiently after a torrid start to inch their team towards a respectable score.

It was an embarrassing end for both. Rudolph, who played Graeme Swann far better than he did Kevin Pietersen at Headingley, looked comfortable throughout his innings. He undid it all straight after tea, attempting to push an innocuous Swann delivery into the leg side but managing only to inside-edge the ball into his stumps.

Duminy picked up the slack, showing the pitch for what it was: easy paced and batsman-friendly. Then, with the new ball just three balls old, he stretched to a wide one from the excellent James Anderson to give him his third wicket and Matt Prior's fourth catch. Anderson continued to probe with the new ball but bad light sent them off the field.

Under cloud cover Graeme Smith had opted to bat and was soon regretting it. Anderson attacked from around the wicket and had Smith caught behind after review for 14.

While Steven Finn, who was preferred to Tim Bresnan, was struggling with his line, his inconsistency worked in his favour. A bouncer down the leg side strangled Alviro Petersen and, two balls later he produced the delivery of the day, nipping in back down the slope to hit the top of Hashim Amla's off stump.

Jacques Kallis was next to go, gloving behind. He was given not out but, on review, third umpire Rod Tucker overturned the decision despite evidence that Kallis's glove was off the bat handle.

At that stage South Africa were 54 for 4 but the diligence of Duminy and Rudolph, plus Vernon Philander making a mockery of his top Test score of 29 with an unbeaten 46, has put them back into the Test.

Date: 16/08/2012 19:14:03 by AMiller
In: Today | England |