The Australian home Test Cricket summer has now came to a close today for this 2022/23 edition at the Sydney Cricket Ground, with Australia trying to finish up the job ASAP after we missed out the entire Day 3 & first half of Day 4’s play yesterday due to extreme wet weather.
Although there were some great moments moments along the way – such as when the Aussies bowled the Proteas all out for 255 in this 2nd innings spell that prevented SA from escaping the follow-on by only 21 runs; So does a 4fer from Josh Hazlewood who just returned to the starting XI a few days ago from injury.
However, it proved to be such a tall order other than dismissing Proteas’ skipper & opener Dean Elgar way early for yet another consecutive occasion, as the Aussies eventually ran out of time on the 5th & last day by settling a draw with SA.
We would’ve loved to see Usman Khawaja get his first-ever Test 200, but that will have to wait when heavy rain forced skipper Pat Cummins to move on for the sake of the team. He still has unfinished though in the opening role by looking to make up more records & consistent 50s/100s for another 3-4 years at age 35.
Plus, hats off to the SA lower-order & even spinning pair from Simon Harmer (47 off 165 balls) & Keshav Maharaj for both staying in there v the challenging Australian bowlers. Harmer would’ve liked a Test 50 but his defending & the way he picks these bad balls has been brilliant all along, while Maharaj is more of a handy batter whenever possible by backing up his half-ton for an 81-ball 53.
Now that this home Test summer is done with Australia ended up undefeated of four wins (two each v West Indies & Proteas) and a draw, bring on the Australian Open Tennis starting on Monday 16th-Sunday 29th January.
