South Africa v England, 4th Test, Day 1 - The day belongs to Stephen Cook

I saw Jimmy Cook play in a Test match against Sri Lanka at Moratuwa in 1993. It was not a live match, but a match recorded in a video cassette which I borrowed from Filmfare Video shop. The quality of the video was not up to the mark, but still it was an enjoyable one. Allan Donald and Brett Schultz were breathtaking and amid some brilliant batting display by the likes of Hasham Tillakaratne, Arjuna Ranatunga, Jonty Rhodes and Andrew Hudson, Jimmy Cook’s dull display hardly caught my attention.

And it should not caught my attention at all. As I grew up and started to understand the game and its history a bit more, I could realize what a bad effect apartheid had on South African cricket. Jimmy Cook’s career was badly affected by apartheid and you can’t expect a forty-year old to dish out a great performance. But mind you, Jimmy was a fantastic opener whose career did not flourish the way it should have.

But his son, Stephen Cook injected hope and a delightful feeling in his father’s heart despite a belated Test debut. Stephen is a solid batsman and his technique looked satisfactory to me. Why it took so late for the South African hierarchy to realize the true worth of Stephen? In my opinion, he should have been included in the team since the first Test. Keeping in mind about his staggering success in domestic cricket last season, preferring  Stiaan van Zyl over him seemed a pretty awkward one.

His century-partnership with Hashim Amla proved that years of struggle and spending a lot of time in domestic cricket have not only made him a mature batsman, but a cricketer who is devoid of shakiness. He gelled so well with a superstar like Amla that none will think that he was playing in his maiden Test match.   

 By the way, the sort of batting display Amla scripted can be tagged as graceful. Some of his shots were directly from the top-drawer – artistic amalgamation of pristine timing and velvety wrist work. Yet another hundred for Amla while Stephen is now a part of cricketing history. A brilliant hundred to his name to justify his selection and of course make his father proud.

As soon as the partnership was broken, South Africa started to lose wickets quickly. Both AB de Villiers and JP Duminy frustrated big time. Duminy played a nothing-shot and sadly, his talent never transformed into deeds. Temba Bavuma and Quinton de Kock arrested a certain collapse.

I could not find the sharpness among the English bowlers which had been evident in the previous Tests. In this Test series, Steve Finn has been the most influential bowler for me. Broad dished out a magical spell while Moeen fetched wickets when needed, but when it came to building pressure, Finn has been brilliant. He has been the main man in creating the platform for crucial breakthroughs. England came back into the game later today, but the Finn-factor was missing throughout the day.

Thank You

Faisal Caesar