Test Champs final, Oz vs SA at Lords, June 11-15

[mikesiva]

IMHO de Zorzi should have played ahead of Stubbs. He could have opened the batting, allowing Rickelton to bat at three, and Mulder in his more natural position at six.

[sussexpob]

IMHO de Zorzi should have played ahead of Stubbs. He could have opened the batting, allowing Rickelton to bat at three, and Mulder in his more natural position at six.

De Zorzi has been outclassed against everyone except BDs C team bowling attack. But then again, I think so has Mulder and Stubbs.

[sussexpob]

Markram gets out one hit before the end.... Played superbly, well done to him.

[mikesiva]

South Africa 285-5

Markram 136
Bavuma 66

Starc 3-69

SA win by five wickets.

Saffers win the World Test championships!

It's good to see a team outside of the Big Three winning this again.

[Red Devil]

Markram gets out one hit before the end.... Played superbly, well done to him.

Match winning innings - terrific fightback from SA!

A great test match all round really - great entertainment and the pendulum swung both ways but Aus seemed well set till the Markram and Bavuma partnership

[Arthur Crabtree]

SA join Aus and NZ as winners. Impressive runchase.

Don't get the impression this competition has taken off. But maybe I would have noticed it more if England had qualified.

[Durhamfootman]

Markram gets out one hit before the end.... Played superbly, well done to him.

could have been two Durham players bringing it home. I wanted Bedders to hit the winning runs, but Verreyne made sure it was him by blocking every ball, with 2 runs needed, until taking a single off the last delivery of the over, to ensure it was him in the next over

Part of me wondered whether Starc would fire a wide rather than let SA hit the winning runs. Maybe this an Aussie side with a different ethos to the 'career ending' 'leg breaking' Clarke regime controlled by "I know nurrrthing' Lehmann

[GarlicJam]

of course there is a modicum of disappointment that Aus did not win, but how could you not take at least some pleasure from South Africa's great win?

Thoroughly deserved, imo. I have no issues with them qualifying for the final, either. A fairly good contribution across the team, far more so than the Aus team. Great to see how much it means to the team and entourage, also the huge number of fans at the ground (far better support for RSA for the whole test, especially the last day).
Having spent a year in South Africa, I have some idea how this will go down with most of the population. They do like to celebrate.

Not only has this immediately been great for the country, and should have a huge boost for Cricket in RSA in short and medium-to-long term - but is also good for world cricket.

[sussexpob]

Having spent a year in South Africa, I have some idea how this will go down with most of the population. They do like to celebrate

Can't wait for all the Saffer fans from rugby social media to jump across to cricket to sh*t talk the world for the next few years. Judging purely on SM, South Africa sports fans are the most intolerable people going. As an example, I seen plenty of Saffers infiltrating English cricket boards in the last 24 hours to remind us how much better SA are than England, because they beat us in a competition we did not play against each other in. Maybe someone needs to remind them they have won 1 series in the last 7 we have played, and that was 18 years ago.

[Arthur Crabtree]

So too patriotic to claim asylum in Trump's US?

[GarlicJam]

So too patriotic to claim asylum in Trump's US?

hey, they are not THAT proud - they can manage to do both.