South Africa is at the top of the World Test Championship table while India slipped to fifth after a crushing defeat against South Africa at SuperSports Park in Centurion. Rohit and his company faced an embarrassing defeat by an innings and 32 runs in the first Test.
India’s dream of defeating South Africa on their soil was shattered. The Proteas crushed the Rohit Sharma-led Indian side in the first Test match. Despite a brave fight in the first innings, the Indian batters failed to stand against the South African bowling attack. The heavy defeat against South Africa dropped India to 5th position in the World Test Championship rankings.
In a bowling-friendly condition, Indian bowlers could not deliver an impressive performance. The batting line-up of South Africa was brave enough to put up a total of 408 on board. Though the veteran opener of South Africa, Dean Elgar, missed out on his double hundred by a few runs, he had already cemented the South African scoreboard with his 185 runs’ knock.
Dean Elgar has become the second-highest scorer as a South African opener at SuperSport Park in Centurion. Besides, it was also the fifth-highest individual score by a South African batsman at the unique venue.
On day 3, Marco Jansen concreted a solid partnership with Elgar. The 6th wicket partnership between Jansen and Elgar added 119 runs, throwing India almost out of the contest.
In the second innings, Virat Kohli was a lone warrior to put some resistance to South African bowlers with 76 runs. In front of debutant Nandre Burger and veteran pacer Kagiso Rabada, the Indian batting line-up collapsed like a house of cards for just 131 runs leading to an embarrassing innings defeat. The left-arm pacer Nandre Burger took 7 wickets for 83 runs in the first Test.
WTC points table
The dominant victory over India took the Proteas to the top of the World Test Championship table. India’s poor performance dragged them to fifth in the table. On the other hand, Pakistan and Bangladesh come ahead of India.
Despite holding the second spot, Pakistan is in danger as they are forced on the back foot by Aussies in the Boxing Day Test in Melbourne. The Black Caps are in the third position whereas Bangla Tigers are holding the fourth place.
South Africa started their World Test Championship journey with a victory on a brilliant note defeating the two-time runners-up India by an innings and 32 runs in the Boxing Day Test. With a 100-point percentage, they captured the top ranking as they secured all 12 points from the game. After Temba Bavuma’s injury, Dean Elgar took the command and smashed a great knock of 185 runs leading his team to reach 408 runs in total.
Rohit-led Indian side fell four spots down to fifth as India’s points percentage decreased from 66.67 to 44.44. There are high chances of being dragged to the 6th spot for India as the Aussies are in a comfortable situation to beat Pakistan in the ongoing Test in Melbourne.
India’s poor test performance on defeat since 2021
In the past two years, India have just won a single Test in SENA (South Africa, England, New Zealand and Australia). They continued their losing streak since then in South Africa and England. In total, India have lost three matches in South Africa and two in England.
