Even as the Indian bowlers toiled hard and the energy of the Indians went down, senior India off-spinner R Ashwin showed his presence of mind when he gave a subtle, tacit warning to non-striker Marco Jansen for backing up too far outside the bowling crease.
Even after India dismissed Dean Elgar, Marco Jansen trudged on steadily with the pitch not doing much, and the Indian bowlers regularly offering run-scoring opportunities to the lanky all-rounder.
In the 98th over of South Africa’s innings, with Gerald Coetzee on strike, R Ashwin halted in his delivery stride and turned back toward his bowling mark. Although no words were spoken by either players, there were perhaps some eye gestures exchanged between R Ashwin and Jansen, with the senior off-spinner indicating of a warning for the batter to move out of the crease before the ball was bowled.
Check it out here: R Ashwin gave a mankad warning to Marco Jansen
A warning by Ashwin as Jansen trying to back too much. pic.twitter.com/0u5uCeudkH
— Johns. (@CricCrazyJohns) December 28, 2023
Ravi Ashwin warned Marco Jansen ⚠️
📷: Hotstar #RaviAshwin #MarcoJansen #SAvIND #Cricket #Sportskeeda pic.twitter.com/DYHBE43DFF
— Sportskeeda (@Sportskeeda) December 28, 2023
Ashwin took his first wicket of the match in the form of Gerald Coetzee. He has bowled tidily in this game, returning with figures of 18-5-41-1, but Shardul Thakur and Prasidh Krishna have not backed up the spells from Ashwin, Bumrah, and Siraj.
Dean Elgar and Marco Jansen forged a huge stand of 111 (199) that has all but batted India out of this Test match. Gerald Coetzee cracked two fours and a six before getting out to Ashwin at the stroke of lunch. South Africa have taken a lead of 147 by lunch on Day 3.
Earlier, Elgar got out for the score of 185, which is only 60 less than what the entire Indin team managed to score in their first innings. Shardul Thakur gave India the breakthrough of Elgar.
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