The flat deck at the Mangaung Oval was conducive to batting and this is reflected in South Africa’s declare innings of 509/7.

India themselves also did well with the bat and made the going tough for the South African bowlers.

The SA A coach, Malibongwe Maketa, emphasised the importance of partnerships.

“It was a decent start in terms of the series. Losing the toss and being sent to bat, being two wickets down and the way we recovered was very positive.

“Well done to Pieter Malan on a good innings in terms of what we needed at the time as a team and gladly supported by Sinethemba Qeshile and Jason Smith, guys who came in and really batted well.

“We pride ourselves on partnerships, we got those, and it is something we want to build on.

“When it comes to the bowling, unfortunately we weren’t that good at the start, but we pulled it back quite nicely in terms of our control of line and length, which is encouraging and something we want to build on going forward into the next game.

“Going forward, it is important for us to stay positive in terms of looking to take 20 wickets,” he began.

“We’ve seen that it is not going to be easy, we knew coming in it was not going to be easy to take 20 wickets, so when it comes to our bowling attack, we are really going to be hard on ourselves in terms of our skillset and executing our disciplines to be able to take the 20 wickets.

“Without taking anything for granted, the batters will need to, again, put us in a position where we are able to set positive fields for long periods of time to be able to take 20 wickets.

“In saying all that, we still need to bat well, and we are looking to that challenge. It’s a good Indian team and the guys will be tested. A few guys are coming in from the Indian side, so we are looking forward to that as well.”

Play at the Mangaung Oval is set to get underway at 10:00 on Tuesday morning.

Morgan Piek OFM Sport