Test matches can look very different from Marco Jansen’s vantage of roughly seven feet. It could even prove a disadvantage if he can’t hit the off stump as often as he likes.
“I’m still jealous of people that get the ball to squat and nip back,” he confessed before the media on Monday. “Like a different bowler, that’s hitting top-of-off, for example. I’ve always been jealous of those people who are a bit shorter than me.”
But while India’s seamers zoned in on lengths that targeted the height of the stumps, Jansen simply had to send down deliveries naturally, to record a spectacular six for 48 within three succinct spells as India folded for 201 in their first innings.
There was reward in what Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj were chasing for their combined 64 overs in the first innings. But Jansen’s giraffe vision was suited for effectiveness at Guwahati’s ACA Stadium. His feats, coupled with largely obtuse strokeplay, converged to sting hosts India on Day Three of the Guwahati Test, ending with South Africa 314 runs ahead.
India’s batting vehicle observed several cases of silly accidents on the hellish “road” that they had spent trundling on, for over 11 hours of the weekend. In the 30 deliveries of precision disturbed only by the Tea break, South Africa’s salvo of pace and spin with Jansen and the metronomic Simon Harmer, stubbed India to a point of incoherence.
A precipitous collapse that plucked four of his top-order mates before noon, did not ward off Kuldeep Yadav from the sights of the “road” he called the track, last evening in the press conference. From that situation where their chances began to cut slim, the left-handed No. 9 stood defiant in his longest Test innings to negotiate 134 deliveries, more than anybody in his team.
