Twenty-three wickets fell on day one at Newlands in the second Test of the two-match series between South Africa and India. These are some of the records that were set.
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After losing the toss, India bowled out South Africa for 55 by lunch on day one. This is now the lowest total by any side against India, eclipsing New Zealand’s 62 at Mumbai in 2021/22.
The lowest by any side against India at home was Australia’s 83 at Melbourne in 1980/81; South Africa’s previous lowest against India was 79 at Nagpur in 2015/16; while South Africa’s 84 at Johannesburg in 2006/07 used to be their lowest against India at home.
This is also the second-lowest total on home soil in the 21st century, after the West Indies’ 47 against England at Kingston in 2003/04.
This is also South Africa’s lowest score since their readmission to Test cricket. Sri Lanka had bowled them out for 73 at Galle in 2018. In fact, it was their lowest since 1932.
South Africa had not been bowled out for a lower score at home since 1899, though they had been bowled out for 43, 47, 30, and 35 before that.
At 23.2 overs, this is also the shortest all-out innings against India. The previous record, of 25.1 overs, had also come against South Africa – at Johannesburg in 2006/07.
Mohammed Siraj registered his career-best figures of 6-15. Shardul Thakur (7-61) and Harbhajan Singh (7-120) both have seven-wicket hauls in South Africa, but of all Indians, no bowler had conceded as few while taking five wickets in the country. Mohammed Shami had taken 5-28 at Johannesburg in 2017/18.
Among Indians, Siraj needed the eighth-fewest balls to take five wickets (47) and the second-fewest to six wickets (53). The records rest, in that order, with Harbhajan (27) and Jasprit Bumrah (37).
Siraj’s 6-15 are the second-best figures by any bowler in the first session of a Test match, after Stuart Broad’s 8-15 at Nottingham in 2015. In fact, in all Test cricket, Tom Richardson (6-39 in 1896), Graham McKenzie (6-34 in 1967/68), and Trent Boult (6-32 in 2017/18) are the only others to have taken six wickets before lunch on day one.
Mukesh Kumar, too, had a career-best, of 2-0. He became the third bowler in history, after Richie Benaud (3-0 against India at Delhi in 1959/60) and Joe Root (2-0 against Sri Lanka at Galle in 2020/21) to take two wickets in an innings without conceding a run.
India overtook South Africa’s total in 9.3 overs, the fewest where data is available. The previous record, of 11.2 overs, was held by South Africa, against Zimbabwe (who made at Cape Town in 2004/05) and New Zealand (45 at Cape Town in 2012/13).
India set the eighth instance of six ducks in a Test innings. One of the previous seven instances was India’s, against England at Manchester in 2014.
India collapsed from 153-4 to 153 all out, making it the first instance of a team losing six wickets on the same score. England held the previous record of the worst last-six-wickets collapse, of 3 runs: they went from 147-4 to 150 all out at Melbourne in 1990/91. For a six-wicket collapse anywhere at in the innings, the previous worst of 1 run came when New Zealand went from 58-3 to 59-9 against Pakistan at Rawalpindi in 1964/65.
Dean Elgar made 4 and 12 in his final Test match, which was enough to make him the fourth South African to make a thousand Test runs against India, after Jacques Kallis (1,734), Hashim Amla (1,528), and AB de Villiers (1,334). Elgar retired with 1,012 runs.
The 23 wickets that fell in the day were the second-most on the first day of a Test match. At Melbourne in 1901/02, Australia made 112, bowled out England for 61, and reached 48-5 by stumps. The record for any day is 27, at Lord’s in 1888, on the second day.
South Africa made 62-3 by stumps, making it the first instance of a team overtaking its first-innings score in the second innings on day one. The closest a side had come to achieving this was South Africa at Melbourne in 1931/32: they made 36 and 5-1 on either side of Australia’s 199.
Tristan Stubbs became the third cricketer to bat twice and the second to be dismissed twice in the first day of his Test career. There were 16 debutants in the Port Elizabeth Test match of 1895/96, where England made 185 and South Africa 93 on the first day. England opened with debutants Charles Wright and Harry Butt, and Butt was out before stumps.
