Two of the most satisfying feelings in cricket for a captain are overcoming a fifth-day rearguard – hours of hard work paying off at the last – and a punt paying off immediately. Embattled England captain Joe Root had the combined joy of the latter contributing to the former in the second Test against South Africa at Cape Town.

One ball after Joe Root puts in a leg slip, van der Dussen inside edges one straight to the man placed there.#SAvENGpic.twitter.com/llXCPeEeCY

— Wisden (@WisdenCricket) January 7, 2020

With Rassie van der Dussen providing the bulk of the Proteas’ late resistance, having faced 139 balls for his 17 runs, a leg slip was brought into play, and after one ball England were rewarded, with van der Dussen hitting straight to James Anderson.

“That is absolute genius,” said Nasser Hussain on commenatary. “Don’t you love it when a plan comes together? Leg gully was put there and it went straight to him.” Hussain later described it as Root’s best Test as captain.

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“It doesn’t matter what you try,” said Shaun Pollock on commentary. “Think out of the box, try and create that half chance, and this worked out brilliantly. You can’t leave those. To tell yourself after years and years of practising that you must let it go past, it’s not an easy thing to do.”

While Root credited Broad for forcing the change in the post-match presentation, Sky‘s Ian Ward added that Root deserved to take some praise for allowing the move, a point he accepted.

Broad revealed that there was an element of fortune to the dismissal and that while the fielder was in action straightaway, the plan hadn’t worked exactly as intended.

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“I put a leg slip in to try and get him to stay leg side to bring the outside edge into play, and then missed my line by about three foot and he guided it to leg slip,” Broad said. As Napoleon Bonaparte said, “I’d rather have lucky generals than good ones.” Could this be the moment of luck on which Root’s stint as England’s Test captain pivots?