South Africa 453 (Maharaj 84, Elgar 70, Tail 6-135) and 176 for 6 dec. (Erwee 41, Verreynne 39*, Taijul 3-67) beat Bangladesh 217 (Mushfiqur 51, Mulder 3-25, Harmer 3-39) and 80 (Maharaj 7-40, Harmer 3-34) by 332 runs
When the Test series will be read about years later, it will say South Africa 2, Bangladesh 0. Many would take it as a usual occurrence since Bangladesh have usually been below-par in Tests in South Africa. However, this time around, the hosts were without their frontline bowling attack, and had lost the preceding ODI series to Bangladesh for the first time at home. Keshav Maharaj, though, made sure the IPL stars were not missed as he helped South Africa demolish the visitors in the second Test, in Gqeberha by 332 runs and complete a clean sweep.
Maharaj took 7 for 40 in the fourth innings to skittle Bangladesh for a meagre 80, thus becoming the first bowler in Test history to take seven-wicket hauls in consecutive fourth innings. He had returned figures of 7 for 32 when Bangladesh were rolled over for 53 in the fourth innings of the first Test, in Durban. In the process, Maharaj also completed 150 wickets in Test cricket. Simon Harmer took three wickets in this innings, as he did in that instance, as South Africa, once again, embarrassed Bangladesh by just using two bowlers.
Chasing 413, Bangladesh started the fourth morning on 27 for 3 and they would have hoped that there would not be a repeat of the Durban collapse. But the Bangladesh batters wilted under pressure.
Mushfiqur Rahim was the first to depart, when he edged Maharaj to Dean Elgar at slips, in the second over of the day. Mominul Haque fell to the left-arm spinner in his next over, top-edging a sweep which he couldn’t quite reach, with Ryan Rickelton completing an easy catch at square leg. Yasir Ali then top-edged Harmer in his attempted slog-sweep, giving Lizaad Williams, the only fielder on the leg-side boundary, an easy catch. Bangladesh had slipped to 44 for 6, and we were only in the fifth over of the morning.
Litton Das struck five fours in his 27 off 33 balls, before he too, lost his head. Maharaj lured him way out of the crease, but Litton missed the ball by a foot, as Kyle Verreynne completed an easy stumping. Maharaj then had Mehidy Hasan Miraz caught behind and Khaled Ahmed lbw, before Harmer ended Bangladesh’s misery.
This article was originally published by Espncricinfo.com. Read the original article here.