On this day, a decade ago, the ardent followers of the game witnessed one of the best bowling days in Test cricket in more than 100 years during the Cape Town Test between South Africa and Australia. As many as 23 wickets fell on the second day of the opening Test match during the Australia tour of South Africa in 2011. This was the first time in over a century when 23 wickets were lost in a single day of a Test match.
In fact, only on three occasions in the history of red-ball cricket more batters were dismissed in a single and all of those instances took place before 1903. The record for most wickets lost in a single day was recorded during a match between England and Australia in 1888 when as many as 27 wickets were lost on a single day.
Batting first, Australia posted a modest total of 284 runs in front of the home team in their first innings. In the second innings of the match, viewers witnessed a peculiar pitch as Australia bowled out South Africa for 96 runs in the afternoon of the second day.
Following the incident, many former cricketers criticized the Proteas squad’s dismal batting outing, claiming that there were no such demons in the pitch. However, the experts were proven wrong after the South African team bundled out Australia for just 47 runs.
Interestingly, Australia lost nine wickets for just 21 runs in that match and were on the verge of getting bundled out inside 30 runs. But, Australia’s last pair put up a 26 runs stands to guide Australia to a 47-run mark with number 11 batter Nathan Lyon top-scoring for his team with 14 runs.
In the end, South Africa needed 236 runs in the fourth innings to win the Test match. Graeme Smith (101 runs off 140 balls) and Hashim Amla (112 runs off 134 balls) both struck centuries as South Africa defeated Australia by eight wickets in three days in Cape Town Test.
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