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Tricky pitch leaves England vulnerable
13:45, Dec 18 2009
England had to scrap for every run and hope to avoid the pitfalls of an increasingly unpredictable pitch on their way to a mid-afternoon 211 for six in reply to South Africa's 418.
The tourists knew they were in for an unequal battle after Andrew Strauss' ominous early departure to an unstoppable shooter from Makhaya Ntini on the third morning of the first Test.
But poor shot selection was as much to blame as England lost wickets at regular intervals.
For Ntini and the majority of the Centurion crowd, Strauss' dismissal was a moment to savour - not least because sponsors Castle were standing a pint at the bar for everyone old enough to be interested to mark the South Africa fast bowler's first wicket of his 100th Test.
In the bigger picture, England's prospects of approaching their hosts' first-innings total - after Strauss himself had invited them to bat first - looked instantly uncertain, if the pitch were to have any more such tricks to play.
Strauss fell four short of his 50 and two off his team's 100 - before his fellow South Africa-born batsmen Jonathan Trott and Kevin Pietersen tried to dig in again.
Trott (28) was content with survival to the point of proceeding almost without playing a shot, and when he finally tried to attack against slow left-armer Paul Harris he paid with his wicket. He went down the pitch but missed a ball which just went on with the angle to hit leg-stump.
Pietersen (40) was first to go in the afternoon - trying to smear an off-side drive off Morne Morkel but instead edging on to off-stump via a crooked bat.
England's extra batsman Ian Bell, controversially selected at the expense of a fifth specialist bowler, could muster only five runs before his off and middle-stump were disturbed as he embarrassingly offered no shot to Harris.
Paul Collingwood continued to battle away but he lost another partner when wicketkeeper Matt Prior top-edged an attempted sweep shot off Harris and Friedel de Wet took the catch.
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