'You're never quite sure what you're going to get at Newlands...'
Friday 1 January 2016 10:05, UK
Expect fireworks in Cape Town as Newlands plays host to the New Year festivities and second Test of the tour.
"It's a really scenic ground overlooked by Table Mountain, with lots of England supporters making it a great occasion and a terrific five days of competition," Mike Atherton, chief cricket correspondent of The Times and Sky Sports cricket expert, says. "It's absolutely beautiful, apart from the brewery to one side, but then, who doesn't like Lion Lager?"
The Number One Test: check out more expert analysis from Athers here...
For England, though, those celebrations have been all too frequently short-lived.
If the pitches at Durban, Johannesburg and Pretoria have familiar characteristics, Cape Town can be trickier to fathom. "You're never quite sure what you're going to get," says Atherton.
"I remember the 1996 match well. It was nil-all going into the final game of a really competitive series and we lost in three days by 10 wickets, but until the tenth-wicket partnership between Paul Adams and Dave Richardson it was really tight again."
With England bowled out for 153, the home side had reached 170-9 before wicket-keeper Richardson and unorthodox spinner Adams put on another 70. "Adams could not bat," Atherton recalls. "He was a classic number 11, a rabbit, so it knocked the stuffing from us.
It started with Dominic Cork throwing five overthrows and the game just got away from us. That's a horrible feeling as captain. Previously, they were scoring at less than two an over and suddenly Adams was playing ridiculous shots.
"I was seething by the time we finally bowled them out and Ray Illingworth, the manager, could see I was at boiling point and asked me if I wanted to open or drop down the order as there was only about 40 minutes before the close. I said I had to bat and got out to Allan Donald for 10."
Only Graham Thorpe offered much resistance as England succumbed for 157, leaving openers Gary Kirsten and Andrew Hudson to knock off the 70 runs required for victory. "The only memorable thing about that day was Thorpe's run out," Atherton says. "The umpire had ruled 'not out', but it was replayed on the big screen showing Thorpe short of his ground. The crowd started booing and that's when the replay was called for and he had to go."
The duels between Donald and Shaun Pollock and the England batsmen, particularly Atherton, became a classic feature between the two teams, and on this occasion it was the pacemen who held the upper hand with 14 wickets - seven apiece - in the match.
"We had lots of great tussles, but Donald got me in that game for 0 and 10," Atherton says.
"They were a good combination: Donald a bit wild, but very quick; Pollock accurate and sharp too, especially in 1995 before county cricket and the international treadmill knocked a yard or two from his pace. They had a balanced attack. Brian McMillan and Jacques Kallis were good all-rounders and Adams bowled all sorts out of the back of the hand. A frog in a blender was the description.
"We'd seen him at the start of the tour when we faced South Africa A and they brought him in after the Second Test. Not many of our players could pick him. The key to picking him was his grip: for his leg-break he held the ball almost in the palm of his hand; for his googly he held it between his thumb and forefinger, although he tried to disguise it with his non-bowling hand."
The solitary victory that took the series ultimately came down to the strength of the batting line-ups. "Kallis was at seven, Richardson number eight and Pollock in at nine," Atherton reflects. "Whereas we went with five bowlers, Jack Russell batting six, Mike Watkinson seven and Dominic Cork eight. They batted much deeper and in the end that probably told."
Four years on from the first tour back to South Africa since apartheid, England returned in 1999 as an unknown quantity.
"It was Michael Vaughan and Chris Adams's first tour as players and Duncan Fletcher's as coach," he explains. "Nasser was new to the captaincy and having a bad time with the bat and it was a team in transition."
The Cape Town Test would put a sharp end to Millennium celebrations for England, humbled by an innings and 37 runs as the hosts took an unassailable 2-0 lead in the series.
On returning in 2005, even Vaughan's impressive team could not stop a third consecutive Newlands defeat. The margin was reduced to 196 runs as Cape Town local Kallis top scored in both innings and the series was squared at 1-1. "We've never batted well in Cape Town," Atherton says. "It's hard to know why."
It would take the next tour for the losing streak to finally be halted, and the unlikely hero was Graham Onions. Last man in and looking to stave off defeat for the second time in the series as he had in Centurion in the opening Test, the Durham seamer successfully blocked out 11 balls with two of the world's best, Morne Morkel and Dale Steyn, flying in at him.
"When you get out of a game like that with a draw, it always feels like a win," Atherton says. "England celebrated like it was a victory even though they were grimly hanging on for dear life."
Watch all the action from the second Test between South Africa and England in Cape Town, live on Sky Sports 2 from 8am on Saturday.
