South Africa v Australia, 2018: 1st Test, Day 3 – Statistical Highlights

Australia continued to extend their domination in the Durban Test despite valiant efforts by the South African bowlers to contain runs. After taking a 189-run first innings lead, four out of Aussie’s top five scored more than 25 but none made more than 53. The home team made a slight comeback to restrict the visitors from 146/3 to 209/9 before the end of the 3rd day’s play due to bad light. Australia already have a lead of 402 and will start the day four as the favourites.

All the stats and numbers that were recorded during another day that was dominated by the bowlers:

2 – Number of times Dean Elgar dismissed Steven Smith in Test cricket. The left-arm spinner got Smith’s wicket in the 2014 Cape Town Test. Elgar took 14 wickets in Test cricket and two in ODI format but Steven Smith is the only player he dismissed twice.

5 – AB de Villiers took five catches in this Test match; the most by him as a fielder in a Test. He took more than five catches on eight occasions previously with all of them while keeping.

9 – Number of wickets by South African spinners in this Test; eight by Keshav Maharaj and one for Dean Elgar. These are the joint-most number of wickets by South African spinners in a home Test match in the last 60 years. As many as nine wickets were taken by the SA spinners in the 2009 Cape Town Test also against Australia.

8/216 – Keshav Maharaj is only the 2nd South African spinner in the last 60 years to take eight wickets in a home Test match. Paul Harris had figures of 9/161 in the 2009 Cape Town Test also against the Aussies.

61.4 – Keshav Maharaj bowled 61.4 overs in this Test match so far. These are the most number of overs bowled by a South African bowler in a Test match since 2011. Paul Harris bowled 69 overs in the 2010 Abu Dhabi Test against Pakistan.

101 – Number of catches for Hashim Amla as a fielder in the Test cricket. He became the 4th South African fielder to take 100 catches in this format.

232 – Innings needed for Steven Smith to complete 10000 runs in International cricket. He is the quickest among the 13 Australians and overall the joint 6th fastest to complete 10000 International runs. Previous quickest Aussie to 10000 Intl runs was Matthew Hayden who reached the milestone in his 239th innings.