Hardik Pandya is one fielder who is known to take screamers in the outfield — diving to his front or running towards the boundary. But on Day 2 of the second Test between India and South Africa at SuperSport Park, Centurion, Pandya dropped a sitter inside the 30-yard circle. Though he made up for it later in the innings with a blinder of an effort.
In 104th over of the Proteas’ innings, Kagiso Rabada decided to take on Ravichandran Ashwin and went down the wicket to hit him over the top. Ashwin deceived Rabada in the air with a flighted delivery. The left-handed batsman ended up miscuing it towards the offside. Pandya and Mohammed Shami ended up making a mess of it, leaving skipper Virat Kohli frustrated.
Pandya redeemed himself later in the innings by taking the catch of Rabada a few overs later. In the 111th over of SA’s innings, Ishant Sharma bowled a short delivery. Rabada tried to pull it away for a boundary but ended up miscuing it to square leg. Pandya came charging towards the ball, put in a dive and got both his hands on the ball, completing the catch.
Here’s the video of the catch –
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? It’s Hardik Pandya!! pic.twitter.com/vPxZXM9aqg
— anshul kothari (@slimshady_ansh) January 14, 2018
Pandya made up for his mistake and celebrated in style as Rabada got out for an individual score of 11 runs and Ishant took his third wicket of the innings on the comeback. The hosts were bundled out for 335 in the first innings.
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India faced a few early blows in the first innings. KL Rahul got out to Morne Morkel as he took a blinder on the follow-through. Whereas Cheteshwar Pujara threw away his wicket on the first ball while trying to sneak a quick single. Later on, Kohli joined Murali Vijay and rebuild the innings in the second session of Day 2.
