Cummins made to regret decision to bowl

The Proteas dominated the opening exchanges of the series decider against Australia at Newlands on Tuesday, reaching 140/0 at lunch with Marques Ackerman registering a maiden half century.

On a beautiful sunny Cape Town morning, Pat Cummins was made to regret an astonishing decision to bowl, on what looks like a strip primed for batting.

Ackerman, 82* and Aiden Markram 56* registered South Africa’s first century opening stand in three years, as they unleashed an array of attacking shotmaking against an Australian line-up that looked bereft in the final half an hour of the session.

Ackerman, playing just his second Test was feeling so full of himself that he walked down the wicket to Josh Hazlewood and launched him over midwicket for four, following that with a deft clip between the slips and gully for another boundary.

To make matters worse for the tourists, Travis Head dropped Markram on 39 off Mitchell Starc. It was a sitter, with the ball looping to Head at cover.

Markram reached his 15th Test half-century shortly before the interval and was fortunate that a thick outside edge of Cummins, off the last ball before lunch, flew past Marnus Labuschagne at second slip. But there was little else to encourage the tourists in the morning.

Australia looked distracted, their heads undoubtedly spinning as they were coming to terms with the absence of their ace batter Steve Smith.

Cummins won the toss for third time in the series, choosing to bowl because of what he described as moisture in the pitch. There was little sign of assistance for the new ball other than some good bounce. An indication the Australian captain erred at the toss was seeing off-spinner Nathan Lyon bowling the 11th over.

“We don’t mind batting,” said Proteas captain, Temba Bavuma.

Australia were rocked before the toss, by the absence of Smith, who had to be omitted from the starting team, because of an on-going neck injury.

Smith was one of four changes made by the tourists to the team that lost the second Test in Gqeberha, with Cameron Green replacing Smith at no.4, Josh Inglis and Cooper Connolly coming in for Beau Webster and Nic Maddinson, while Scott Boland, who batted for over three hours in the second innings at St George’s Park and picked up five wickets, was replaced by Lyon.

“Unfortunately, (Smith’s) neck is not quite right,” Cummins said at the toss. “He tried a little bit (of batting this morning), but it didn’t work out.”

Smith has played 127 Tests, and became the third Australian batter to reach 11000 runs in last week’s second Test. However, a blow to the head from Anrich Nortje in the first Test at Kingsmead, raised concerns about concussion and then in Gqeberha, Smith received treatment on the field for a neck injury.

The day before the match, Smith faced only three balls during a fitness test, before furiously, hurling his bat away, kicking the turf and leaving the net. He conducted another test on Tuesday morning, but continued to feel discomfort.