A tale of two Sundays

What a difference a week makes. Last Sunday in Centurion, South Africa won perhaps the most white-knuckle men's Test of the southern summer; Australian exceptionalism notwithstanding. This Sunday at Newlands, Pakistan treaded water while they waited for it to rise above their heads. Sunday, bloody Sunday.

There was always a danger that, because last week's result booked the South Africans' place in the WTC final at Lord's in June, the second Test would lack relevance and therefore tension. And so it proved.

After three days, Pakistan, who followed on 421 runs behind, need 208 more to make South Africa bat again. South Africa need nine more wickets to win. All involved would concur, privately, that the home side are winners in waiting.

It's difficult to believe that 18 of the 22 players involved at Newlands were also on the field at Centurion. That was a contest that remained in the balance until the winning runs were struck with just two wickets standing. This time, South Africa have not looked like losing since Temba Bavuma chose to bat on a pitch that couldn't be more different from last year's sorry strip at this ground, where the India Test hurtled from start to finish in 107 overs.

The runs flowed freely in a stand of 205 between Shan Masood and Babar Azam, Pakistan's biggest for the first wicket against South Africa. Masood was 102 not out, the first century by a Pakistani in South Africa in the six Tests they have played in the country since Younis Khan and Asad Shafiq each made 111 at Newlands in February 2013.

The captain's innings, his sixth hundred and his first in nine trips to the crease, was measured and elegant. Babar was steadfastness in pads before he drove at Marco Jansen in the third over before stumps and was caught in the gully for 81.

There was much to admire about Pakistan's batting, but it was shadowed by pointlessness. So it wasn't clear whether a joke was intended when, as the score mounted on a pitch that refused to show the slightest hint of wear, someone asked sleepily, "Does anybody have any cocaine, please?"

Maybe the South Africans were also bored; they took their tally of no-balls in this match to 23. Except that it's not a new issue. From their series in Bangladesh in October and November, they have sent down 86 no-balls in six Tests. Kagiso Rabada has been the chief culprit – he's been responsible for 44, or more than half.

"We started with that problem in Bangladesh and sorted it out," Piet Botha, South Africa's bowling coach, told a press conference. "Now it's crept back in. We have to pay attention to it again and make sure we fix it. We worked on it this morning, and that seemed to stop them for a while.

"Sometimes it's the ground, sometimes it's wind, sometimes it's fatigue, sometimes it's a slope. Sometimes how you fix it is different for different people. It's also a concentration thing. Once you bowl a no-ball you have to adjust, and it seemed like in this game we struggled to adjust."

All that said, the pitch has dictated that this match is about runs more than anything else. But on the first two days the South Africans were piling on the runs, and the crowd were sated. After tea on Sunday, while Masood and Babar were reeling them in, about the only thing that kept spectators awake, nevermind engaged, happened before the last drinks break.

Wiaan Mulder bowled to Babar, who defended back to the bowler – who took exception to the batter straying a step or two up the pitch and fired a throw, which was nowhere near the stumps and hit Babar on the legs.

Happily, the ball didn't squirt onto the wicket which, had Babar been out of his ground at the critical instant, would have raised the spectre of him being run out off his pads.

Babar grounded his bat behind the crease before having words, brusquely, with Mulder. That Babar took his bat with him – naturally, not threateningly – to go and talk to Mulder prompted Kyle Verreynne, who had the ball, to underarm it at the stumps in a runout attempt. He missed. Surely the ball would, at that point, have been dead? Verreynne's action earned him a long lecture, complete with finger-wagging, from Kumar Dharmasena.

Asked about the incident at a press conference, Babar smiled as broadly as he and Mulder had at each other in the aftermath and said: "That happened in the heat of the moment. It sometimes happens, and it should stay on the field."

Babar had taken guard for the second innings a minute short of two hours after he had fished at a delivery well wide of his leg stump and been caught behind to give 18-year-old Kwena Maphaka his first strike as a Test player. It was neither a quality delivery nor a quality stroke, but Babar's will always be a quality wicket to take, nevermind as your first.

That ended Babar's otherwise judicious 58 and his stand of 98 with Mohammad Rizwan. It was the start of a slide of six wickets for 76 runs in 57 deliveries that meant Pakistan would follow on.

Babar didn't know then that he would fall victim to another loose stroke before the day was out, so undoing the good work he put in to move past 50 twice. How did that make him feel?

"I started well, but I did not finish well," he said. "Because if you settle at the crease, you must score big."

Indeed. Whether knuckles are white or not, and on any day of the week.