KL Rahul’s unbeaten century helped Team India reach a dominating position on the opening day of the first Test of the three-match series against South Africa here at the SuperSport Park, Centurion on Sunday.
At Stumps on Day 1, India’s score read 272/3 with KL Rahul (122*) and Ajinkya Rahane (40*) unbeaten at the crease. For South Africa, Lungi Ngidi was the pick of the bowlers as he scalped three wickets, including Indian skipper Virat Kohli. Resuming their third session at 157/2, the duo of Virat and Rahul played steady innings and kept on scoring runs from both ends. Unfortunately, Virat failed to leave a mark in the match as he got dismissed on 35 by Ngidi, with Men in Blue’s score read 199/3.
It was later Rahane, who joined Rahul and brought some momentum in the game. Their partnership kept the scoreboard moving for India. Earlier, Ngidi had dismissed Mayank Agarwal on 60 and Cheteshwar Pujara for a golden duck. During the first session, the hosts’ bowlers failed to make early inroads as they barely produced a chance in the first session. They bowled all kinds of lengths in the first session but none had any impact on visitors’ openers. Apart from Kagiso Rabada, no other bowler threatened the opening partnership of India.
With a 50-plus opening partnership, this was India’s first fifty-plus opening stand in SA since December 2010 (Sehwag and Gambhir). Visitors’ had no 50-plus opening partnership in any of the Tests on their last two tours of South Africa.India have never won a Test series in South Africa and Kohli would look to create history on the Proteas turf.
Brief Scores: India 272/3 (KL Rahul 122*, Mayank Agarwal 60; Lungi Ngidi 3-45) vs South Africa.