As it happened - South Africa vs India, 3rd men's Test, Cape Town, 3rd day

Bumrah strikes!

Nine overs after the DRS that reprieved Elgar and fired India all the way up, Bumrah produces the wicket.

The fast bowler's been targeting the left-hander's pads, going full, going straight, trying to york him. This one wasn't quite perfect. It was sliding down leg. Elgar saw a scoring opportunity. He went for the flick. He feathers an edge through to the keeper but it needs DRS to confirm it.

Ultra-Edge shows a big spike and India celebrate. A wicket off the last ball of the day to rejuvenate their push for a first Test series win in South Africa

Here is a snippet from the report.

Rishabh Pant is a shot-maker of such quality that he can take the conditions out of the equation, and for 100 runs and 139 balls in Cape Town he did just that. This wasn’t so much a Test match innings as it was a display of jaw-dropping daredevilry. And at the end of it, India had a lead of 211 and a real chance at making history.

South Africa, who to their immense credit finished 101 for 2, were under siege in the chase, not just from the bowlers but from a very chirpy Virat Kohli. Once, when he was running across from one end of the field to the other, he looked at Dean Elgar and Keegan Petersen and said "Just relax guys. I can hear your heartbeat."

So began a remarkably combative last 29.4 overs of play and it peaked in the 21st.

"Look at them. Look at them playing their defence on screen" Not sure who this is but India are completely peeved by that DRS decision that reprieved Dean Elgar

We know for sure that R Ashwin, the aggrieved bowler, definitely said "Find a better way to win SuperSport"

KL Rahul: Whole country playing against 11 guys.

Kohli again: No point hitting the pads boys. Just bowled and caught behind.

It's a beautiful offbreak.

Tossed up from around the wicket. Drifting in late. Drifting in big. The left-hander is preparing to nudge the ball into the leg side. He's bringing down a straight bat. But this drift. It's too much. It takes the ball clean past the inside edge and hits him on the front pad.

The on-field decision is lbw. Marais Erasmus put the finger up immediately.

But this is Elgar. This is the big man. This is the fighter. He has to review and so he does... and it saves him! Ball tracking says it would bounce over leg stump.

"That is impossible," says someone on the field who sounds suspiciously like umpire Erasmus

Kohli kicks the turf in disappointment, perhaps even disgust. Then he comes to the stump mic so that his words can be heard around the world: Focus on your team as well while they shine the ball, eh? Not just the opposition. Trying to catch people all the time.

Dean Elgar is in the middle of another titanic battle.

He's had balls whizzing past the outside edge.

He's had Virat Kohli making fun of him right in his ear. "Ooooh what a shooooot," said the Indian captain after an uppish drive to mid-off in the 13th over, his tone dripping with so much sarcasm that it prompted a wry smile from his South African counterpart

Elgar loves a battle. The blows he takes on his body, he says, are an honour. That they aren't a measure of his bravery because he believes any South African cricketer would do the same if it means their team can succeed.

He is the big wicket. He is a giant of a wicket.

"We all know what's at stake here, boys. Come on!"

Virat Kohli has been very vocal.

"Can't afford any mistake here, boys!" he screamed looking directly at Aiden Markram.

Kohli wanted the two SA batters to feel the brunt of history. They've have never lost a series to India at home. And perhaps he wanted Markram in particular to feel the brunt of his poor form recently.

All that comes to a head in the eighth over of the final innings in Cape Town with Mohammed Shami snagging Markram's edge not once but twice.

The first time, the ball zips through between slips and gully. The second time, it lands safely in the KL Rahul's hands.

Kohli lets out a shriek again. India are feeling this. They are definitely feeling this. "Guys just relax," he says, possibly to the two SA batters, "I can hear your heartbeat."

Rishabh Pant has yet another high-quality hundred. This wasn’t so much a Test match innings as it was a display of jaw-dropping daredevilry.

At one point not so long ago, he attempted an audacious reverse scoop to the 6'8" Marco Jansen and Hashim Amla, on the broadcast, said "I would have loved to have seen that come off". This, in a nutshell, is Rishabh Pant. He is such a thrillingly free spirit that everyone falls in love with him.

India have a lead of 208 runs. Remember, there have only ever been three successful chases above 200 in Cape Town.

India's lead gets an almighty push towards the 200 mark as Rishabh Pant takes on Duanne Olivier. The six in that 58th over was a stunning shot. The ball was a touch short of good length and yet he still came forward and baseball-swiped it over the long-on boundary.

Swing. There's not been a whole lot of it in this Test match. Kagiso Rabada and Jasprit Bumrah - the two outstanding bowlers in Cape Town - didn't really find any. But Lungi Ngidi has. With a ball that is more than 50 overs old. Can't be reverse, can it? Nope. Shiny side was inside, the ball moved in the opposite direction. Conventional A... I can't type the second letter of that two-letter acronym because, well, this is a family site.

Kohli fell to an outswinger - and it moved very late. Shardul Thakur has fallen to another outswinger - angled into middle and leg stump, forcing the batter to play across the line and nick through to the wicketkeeper. India 170 for 7, leading by 183 runs.

PS: Since 2016, only one visiting batter has faced more balls in a Test match in South Africa than Kohli. England's Dom Sibley (387 in 2020)

India's captain is gone. But what a knock.

He walks off admonishing himself.

But for 142 deliveries he looked un-outable.

It took a moment of genius to take him down - not necessarily from the bowler but from Aiden Markram at second slip, leaping up high and intercepting a red ball that was travelling RAPIDLY with reverse cupped hands over his head.

Kohli batted with purpose - he wanted to prevent a batting collapse - and with Pant at the other end he knew that the runs would come.

He's done it to Nathan Lyon.

He's done it to Jack Leach.

He's now doing it to Keshav Maharaj.

Rishabh Pant is a ferocious hitter of spin bowling.

It's a function of those fast hands, and then his whole-heartedness comes into play. Any time Pant goes for a big shot, he throws the kitchen sink at it.

All of that effort coupled with those magnificently fast hands mean the big hits, they go for big runs.

That first six in this 48th over, a sweep shot even as Maharaj was tossing the ball into the rough outside the left-hander's off stump, sailed over the midwicket boundary even though on the point of impact Pant only hand one of his hands on the bat.

Shiva Jayaraman, senior stats analyst: South Africa pacers have given away 62 invaluable runs straying down the legside in this Test (until lunch on day three). That’s 17% of India’s total in this match; valuable runs given how difficult scoring has been for batters on this pitch. They were also ‘lucky’ to take the wicket of Cheteshwar Pujara even if it wasn’t really a soft dismissal; he was disconcerted by the bounce on that ball from Marco Jansen.

This seeming indiscipline from their pacers has actually worked for South Africa in this series: In the first two Tests, their pacers took six wickets bowling down leg (at times intentionally, but bowling wayward mostly) at an average of 18.7. They took a wicket every 24.5 balls they strayed down the legside. Pretty effective considering bowling all other lines produced a wicket every 23.1 runs and 41.4 balls.

Overall, South Africa's pacers have taken seven wickets at an average of 24.8 runs apiece bowling down leg. To put that number in context, in the last three years in Tests, pacers have averaged 62.2 bowling balls down the legside or wider than that.

Take a look at those wagon wheels. They're a lovely measure of the contrasting methods used by Rishabh Pant and Virat Kohli in the second innings in Cape Town

All those runs in front of the wickets for Pant suggest he has been happy to force the pace. He cut and pulled Kagiso Rabada for fours in the 23rd over. Then danced down the track and walloped Duanne Olivier in the 34th.

This is what Pant does. He is a shot-maker of such quality that he takes the conditions out of the equation. How else do you explain his making 51 off 60 balls at a strike-rate of 85 on a pitch where batters are playing a false shot once every six deliveries (197 not in control out of 1182 bowled)

Kohli, meanwhile, has been completely focused on just staying out there, preventing wickets from falling, preventing a collapse. That's why he's 28 off 127. That's why his biggest scoring area is fine leg. Because he's only hitting out when the bowlers make a mistake.

These two have put on only the fourth fifty-partnership of the game and the longer they're out there, the better are India's chances. Remember, there have only been three successful chases above 200 in Cape Town.

India are 130 for 4 at lunch in the second innings, leading by 143 runs.

There was a ball in the 31st over that beat Virat Kohli's bat.

Now remember, this is peak Kohli. He knows a Test match is there to be won. He knows the longer he's there the better India's chances are. So his game right now is on a different level. But Lungi Ngidi beat him. And then he looked down at the pitch.

That moment is important. He looked down at the pitch because the ball hit a crack, roundabout the 8 metre mark on an stump line to the right-hander, and jagged past the shoulder of Kohli's bat.

Banging it into the pitch there is going to create problems.

Banging it in was Marco Jansen's (10-5-15-2) primary mode of attack in his first spell today. So much so that he kept going scrambled seam.

The thing with that variation is that if, by some luck, the seam lands on the pitch, the ball kicks up. Kohli ended up smelling a few in that first spell, edges lobbing over the top of gully, or falling in no-man's land at silly point. If the ball lands on the leather, it doesn't do much. Or, again if you're lucky, it scoots through lower than the batter expects.

Even with all of this happening, Kohli has been serene. He is trusting his technique. He is trusting his judgment. He was 16 off 43 in the 20th over. He claimed his 17th run off his 80th ball in the 31st over. That's 36 dot balls in between and he wasn't readily ruffled. He knows bounce is a threat and that's why he's playing with softer hands.

Brisbane.

Ahmedabad

And now Cape Town

Rishabh Pant, once again, is in the middle with conditions in the bowlers' favour and a Test match swinging on a knife edge.

If he comes off, he has the ability to score an extremely quick 50-odd and that takes India's lead into fairly safe territory.

The highest successful chase in Cape Town is 334 for 6 by Australia against South Africa in 2002. But that's an anomaly because there have only ever been three successful chases above 200 there.

In some ways, that brainfade in Johannesburg might well play to India's advantage. Pant won't be suckered in so easily this time.

Sunil Gavaskar at the pitch report said it was going to be awkward for the batters today. But that is turning out to be one doozy of an understatement.

South Africa's TALL bowlers are extracting a ton out of the pitch. Even Virat Kohli who has been SUPREME all through the Test ended up looking like a tailender as Marco Jansen hits the deck hard.

These balls are coming from a height of 8 feet or so. And the effort behind them is substantial. They're generating TRAMPOLINE BOUNCE off just back of a length. It's only juuuuuust back of a length but they're rising up to the batters' faces.

India lead by 73 runs right now. If they can get it even to 150, it could easily be game on!

"Watch the ball. Watch the ball!" Rahane says as the sequence begins.

Kagiso Rabada is running in.

The ball is back of a length.

BUT IT SPITS UP!

It's a brute.

It is an ABSOLUTE brute.

Rahane can't leave it. It's too close to the off stump.

So the right-hander plonks his bat out on a fourth stump line in hope of meeting it.

And ordinarily, he would have middled it.

But these last few years have not been ordinary at all for Rahane. He's in a rut. In a massive spiralling rut. And you know that that's when you keep getting jaffas. And this fits the bill.

Rears up at Rahane. Takes the glove. Goes through to the keeper - there's so much venom on it that Kyle Verreynne even with his gloves can't get in under control. Luckily for South Africa, Dean Elgar at first slip is alert to the rebound

The umpire doesn't give it out on field, but SA review and get their man.

PUJARA'S GONE! WHAT A CATCH!

Keegan Petersen is at leg slip.

South Africa have been dogging India's No. 3 with a straighter line, searching for these kinds of close catches.

Pujara plays with his hands lower than most batters. It's part of the reason why his nicks don't always carry to the slip cordon.

But here, in bouncy conditions, that opens him up to bat-pad catches. And in this case, a superb grab, leaping to his right at leg slip.

Incredible reflexes from Petersen. He was horizontal with the ground, right hand reaching for a ball that has passed him! A-may-zingggg.

Now here is Ajinkya Rahane. Perhaps playing for his career. And South Africa are crowding him. Leg slip. Short leg. Two slips and a gully as well.