The late order resilience has always been the hall mark of great teams, probably this was the reason that Australia was desperately looking for a replacement for out of form and out of character Andrew Symonds.
In North and Johnson they have found two all rounders, if their yesterdays batting wasn’t a one time fluke then Australia is lucky to have found two all rounders, both players will add great depth, flexibility and resilience to their batting order.
Johnson in recent times have played several good knocks his average of 31 is also indicative of the fact that he is more than a capable batsman, Scoring 96 against a hostile South African pace battery is not an easy task especially when the runs were scored aggressively.
Australia have come to South Africa with a vengeance in mind, they are playing with a lot of aggression and have selected the right combination, they still have to find a quality spinner and Katich’s long term opening partner, but the rest of the problems have been resolved.
South Africa are reeling at 156/8 they need 115 more runs to avoid follow on. Johnson and Siddle has taken 3 wickets each, only a miracle can now save this match for South Africa.
South Africa are clawing their way back in the match, first they shot out the Australians for 229 just after lunch through some highly aggressive bowling, and then their batsmen scored 178 just for he loss of two wickets, Graeme Smith was all set for a big knock but he got out playing a poor shot. Amla and Kallis are still on the crease, South Africa needs 276 runs from 98 overs and Australia needs 8 wickets, it won’t be easy fr either team, if Australia takes a few quick wickets they will win, and if South Africa doesn’t loose a wicket until lunch then they will win, the match is evenly poised, but one way or the other this match will produce a result.