Temba Bavuma's three-year-old tweet goes viral after Virat Kohli and Ajinkya Rahane's 178-run partnership

South Africa is facing the heat in Pune. Both literally and metamorphically. After having faced a 203-run walloping in the first Test at Vishakhapatnam, the visitors had their backs against the wall coming into this Test against an all-conquering Indian side. And, things have only got worse since then!

Skipper Faf du Plessis once again lost the toss but it wasn’t that bad a toss to lose for the Proteas than it eventually turned out to be. On a track that offered substantial sideways movement, South Africa will be the first one to admit that they did not quite make use of the conditions on offer in the first two hours.

Despite getting Rohit Sharma cheaply, India once again was able to set a solid platform to allow the middle-order to take over at the later stage. Opener Mayank Agarwal scored another gritty hundred while Cheteshwar Pujara got to his first 1st innings half-century since his 192 against Australia in Sydney earlier this year. But, it was the partnership of Virat Kohli and vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane that helped the hosts firm their grip on the match.

Temba Bavuma’s three-year-old tweet goes viral

Rahane came to bat (at 3/198) after India had lost Agarwal and Pujara within a span of few overs, and with Kagiso Rabada in the midst of a good spell, the duo needed to do what they do every time they get together: score a mountain of runs. Kohli and Rahane have been one of India’s most-prolific pairs (for the 4th wicket) in Test cricket.

They are to this generation what Sachin-Ganguly was to the previous one in Test cricket. In 41 innings of batting for the 4th wicket, the duo boasts of the best average (66.70) and the most number of hundred partnerships (9) among all Indian pairs (min 20 innings) and are only 27 runs behind the celebrated duo of Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly (2695 runs at 64.16 in 44 innings).

The duo was at it again in Pune, racking up another 100+ partnership (178 runs) to help India get into an impregnable position. Interestingly, while Kohli and Rahane were deflating an already beleaguered Proteas attack, a tweet from Temba Bavuma that dates back to October 08, 2016 resurfaced on Twitter.

In that tweet, Bavuma was praising another mastery partnership that the duo was involved-in back then. Bavuma was talking about the 365-run stand that Kohli and Rahane had accumulated against the Kiwis during the third Test in Indore in 2016. 

Gobsmacked by the masterclass that the du had put-on, Bavuma had tweeted: “Kohli & Rahane could watch these guys bat all day #masterclass #indvsnz’.” Little, did he know, that three years down the line he’d b at the receiving end of it.

Kohli & Rahane, could watch these guys bat all day #masterclass #indvsnz

— Temba Bavuma (@tbavuma10) October 8, 2016