SA A v IND A, 1st unofficial Test, Day 3 Review: Hosts four wickets away from a win

South Africa A stand only four wickets away from taking the lead in the unofficial Test series against India A as the visiting side are 192/6 chasing 447 at end of day 3. The home side declared their innings after Lunch at 220/5 to extend their first-innings lead of 256. South Africa A will now have one full day’s play time to bag the remaining 4 wickets while India A needs another 255 runs, who are unsure about all-rounder Vijay Shankar’s availability.

Resuming the 3rd day at 66/0, the South African A side made efforts to accumulate quick runs. Stephen Cook fell in the 3rd over of the day on his overnight score of 32 but their Captain Aiden Markram put on 70 for the 2nd wicket Rudi Second. Markram scored 79 off 120 balls with 7 fours and 3 sixes before getting out to Mohammed Siraj. Rudi Second scored 74 off 109 with 6 fours while Miller struck 29-ball 27 before they declared with a lead of 446. Navdeep Saini picked up 3 wickets in his 9 overs conceding just 20 runs.

Openers Sudip Chatterjee and Ravikumar Samarth began the chase positively by putting on 47 in 12 overs before Andile Phehlukwayo struck twice in two overs to dismiss Chatterjee for 20 runs and first innings top scorer Shreyas Iyer for just 1 run. Samarth got run out for the 2nd time in two innings leaving the side 3 down for 54.

Captain Karun Nair struck 5 fours during his stay of 38 balls in which he scored but was trapped in front by Junior Dala. Ishan Kishan too showed intentions of scoring runs as he struck 6 fours and a six in his innings of 39 coming in just 32 balls. Ankit Bawne put on small stands to help India A to surpass their first innings total.

He put on 44 runs for the 4th wicket and 49 for the 5th wicket with Nair and Kishan respectively. A 46-run stand by Bawne for the 6th wicket along with Shahbaz Nadeem towards the end of the day kept India A’s hopes of going close to the target but a return catch to Junior Dala brought an end to his innings of 46 with 3 fours and a six.

Brief Scores:

South Africa A 1st innings 346/10 (Stephen Cook 120, David Miller 78; Mohammed Siraj 4/61)

India A 1st innings 120/10 (Shreyas Iyer 31, Vijay Shankar 25 r.h.; Beuran Hendricks 3/23)

South Africa A 2nd innings 220/5 dec (Aiden Markram 79, Rudi Second 74; Navdeep Saini 3/20)

India A 2nd innings 192/6 (Ankit Bawne 43, Ishan Kishan 39; Andile Phehlukwayo 2/21)

Target – 447