1st Test: Amla, Kallis propel South Africa on opening day

Pair dominates Australia as tourists reach 255 for two

BRISBANE: Hashim Amla and Jacques Kallis became South Africa’s greatest scoring partnership as the Proteas dominated Australia’s bowlers to seize control on day one of the first Brisbane Test.

The pair drove home the advantage with an unbeaten century stand as the world’s best team blunted the Australian attack after winning the toss.

When bad light stopped play eight overs earlier, South Africa were 255 for two with Amla unbeaten on 90 and Kallis providing solid support on 84. At day’s end, the pair had accumulated 3,607 runs together in their 58th Test, the highest number of runs scored in a partnership in South Africa.

“We wanted to put our peg in the ground and I think we did that really well,” said opening batsman Alviro Petersen.

“Two wickets down, we’re in a comfortable position but tomorrow’s going to be really important, to back that up and make sure the work doesn’t go to waste.”

Michael Clarke used six bowlers in a bid to winkle a breakthrough, but it was a day Australia were wanting to put behind them as they bid to stay unbeaten at the Gabba ground for 24 years.

“Definitely a long day,” said paceman James Pattinson. “It wasn’t the Gabba wicket that we were used to. It was a bit slow and there was no sideways movement.

“You can make excuses, but we probably lacked a bit of penetration and consistency and our maiden count was the big thing. When it’s not playing as much as you would like, you  want to dry up the runs a bit as we probably didn’t do that.”

Australia earlier left out paceman Mitchell Starc and went with the spin of Lyon while the Proteas gave Rory Kleinveldt his Test debut in a four-strong pace attack.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 10^th, 2012.