India Spin When They're Winning

The third and final test has been played of South Africa's tour of India, with the hosts picking up a win to draw the series 1 - 1. India went in to the second innings with a slender lead of 60 runs but soon had the South Africans in a sweat and wishing they could pack their bags back up, slip off the old leg pads and quietly vanish into the sunset.

What was obvious was the heat clearly wasn't the only thing getting to the tourists, as the spin of the Indian bowlers soon took effect. Although Chawla (0 - 18) appeared to be as effective as a one legged duck throwing boiled eggs down the wicket, the spin of Harbhajan (4 - 44) and the part time bowler Sehwag (3 - 12), whose first delivery took the wicket of Kallis (15), reduced South Africa to 79 - 4. Sehwag then took the wicket of Smith (35), which effectively ended the game for South Africa. Sehwag had added two more names to his impressive collection of top order batsmen, he might only have taken 20 odd test wickets, but for a part time bowler he's got the better of some of the games best.

After the break Harbhajan took the wicket of AB De Villiers (7) and the tourists found themselves in real trouble on 90 - 5, a lead of just 30 overall, so the last thing they needed was their trousers pulled down with the loss of more wickets. Step up Sharma (2 - 18), brought into the attack by the captain, Dhoni, and before you knew it two more quick wickets fell which left the game practically over. So over in fact that I decided to pop down to Tesco's to quickly get my weekly bits, by the time I had got back the Indian batsmen had scored the required 62 runs and the players were dusting themselves down in the pavilion and laughing at a photo of Graham Smiths mum in the nude. Why they had that picture is unknown, what is even more unknown is why they were all stood there in the nude, but then that's cricket.