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Australia vs South Africa 2nd Melbourne Test Highlights 3rd Day

Cricket Highlights: Australia vs SA Day 3, 2nd Melbourne (MCG) Test.

Scoreline: South Africa: 459. Jean Paul Duminy 166. Dale Steyn 76. Paul Harris 39. Lead by 65.

After Day 2, there were two possibilities one speculated going into Day 3 – would Australia pull out a long finger to all their detractors; would Duminy reinforce his stature. Well, Duminy did where Australia failed. One of the best hundreds ever played so early in a career.

Keeping Duminy going was Dale Steyn – he was streaky to start with and dropped a couple of times, but several stunning drives made up for all that, as South Africa went about doing unto the Australians what they’ve done for so many years.

One might argue that these kind of things happen in cricket – but when you see Australia not taking their chances and luck riding alongside the other team, it’s an indication of a team under pressure. If today’s cricket had all those proclaiming the end of Australian dominance smirking, one gets the feeling that Day 4 is possibly the last chance Australia have to tell the world that though there’s not much separating them from India and South Africa, they still are the team to beat.

During the recent India tour, there were several potentially exciting days of test cricket – but tomorrow could well be the Day to watch. Not many are interested anymore if Hayden is an old fisherman or not, the sound of his bat all that they’ll be paying attention to.

India vs England 2nd Mohali Test Highlights 3rd Day | KP Hundred

Scoreline: England 282/6. Kevin Pietersen 144, Andrew Flintoff 62, Alistair Cook 50

Brief Highlights also available in Video: After a delayed start to play, India were right there snapping at England middle-order, with two quick wickets. England were 1 run and 2 wickets down, when Kevin Pietersen stepped in to see Yuvraj Singh – a bowler he’s been troubled by in the ODIs and previous test – given the 3rd over the day. A fascinating duel ensued, with Yuvraj almost snaring KP off the last ball of the over. Oddly, Yuvraj didn’t bowl again for a while.

Pietersen went on to produce a counter-attacking century – easily one of the great hundreds in recent times. It included the moment of the day – a Switch Shot Six off Harbhajan Singh. KP has hardly looked himself on this tour – even the ODI hundred he scored was just about ok. This hundred today made up for all that – the moving around the crease, switch-shots, threats of a switch-shot before adapting to the threat-induced new line of the ball, and those glorious drives. The Indian bowlers were so put off by the attacking partnership by Pietersen-Flintoff that they took to bowling outside the off (pacers) and leg (Mishra). Along the way, KP got involved in a Sledging contest with Yuvraj Singh.

India however came back remarkably in the last few moments of the game, getting first KP and then Flintoff off the last ball of the day – a super catch by Gambhir.

When Zaheer Khan first came into the Indian team, he had a fantastic yorker, which disappeared for several years, surfacing now and then. Two of them popped up today in searing fashion.