AUSTRALIA TOUR TO SA
Zaahier Adams|Published
The sun arrived first.
Not tentatively, peeking through clouds, but with the sort of authority that makes you wonder if the previous two days had ever happened at all. After 48 hours of rain delays, covers and frustration, St George's Park awoke on Tuesday morning bathed in golden light.
Suddenly, everybody wanted a piece of it.
Spectators sprawled across the famous grass embankments. Sunglasses replaced rain jackets. Schoolchildren packed into the Western Stand and filled the air with shrieks, songs and endless energy. For the first time in this Test match, South Africa's oldest cricket ground felt as though it was breathing properly again.
And then came the music.
The famous St George's Park brass band, silenced for most of the match by weather and inactivity, finally had a stage. The trombones sang, the trumpets blared and familiar melodies rolled around the old ground, mingling with laughter and conversation beneath cloudless Gqeberha skies.
After the sparse crowds that characterised the opening Test at Kingsmead, it felt less like a Test match emerging from a weather interruption and more like South Africa’s greatest summer of cricket finally getting permission to begin.
Not because every seat was filled. They weren't. But because there was life. Noise. Colour.
Hope.
The travelling Australians contributed their share too. Clusters of supporters dressed in unmistakable canary yellow dotted the pavilions and grass banks like splashes of paint on a green canvas. Every Australian appeal was met by their cheers. Every South African boundary by the roar of the locals.
At the centre of it all stood two cricketers who could hardly have appeared more different.
One compact. One towering.
One methodical. One explosive.
Temba Bavuma and Marco Jansen looked like cricket's odd couple, yet together they produced the innings that dragged this contest from the shadows into the sunlight.
Bavuma batted as he so often does when South Africa need him most, with defiance stitched into every movement. Former Proteas seamer Garnett Kruger described him on commentary as the team's gom - the glue holding everything together.
It was a fitting description.
While wickets had tumbled around him throughout the series, Bavuma remained steadfast. Every leave, every defensive push and every single carried the weight of responsibility.
He looked less like a batter compiling an innings and more like a captain refusing to abandon his post.
At the other end, Jansen was operating in an entirely different mood.
Most players try to survive against Australia.
Jansen appeared determined to enjoy himself.
The giant left-hander drove with abandon, swung fiercely through the leg side and punched anything remotely overpitched back past the bowlers. There was freedom in everything he did. Freedom and audacity.
With every boundary, the atmosphere lifted another notch.
You could almost feel the crowd recalculating what was possible.
A rescue mission no longer seemed fanciful. A revival no longer seemed confined to wishful thinking.
Australia, seasoned masters of spoiling a party, inevitably responded.
The short balls arrived. The verbal pressure followed. Then came an unlikely card from Pat Cummins' deck: Matthew Renshaw.
For a brief moment it looked inspired.
Jansen was given out.
The noise evaporated instantly.
A collective groan rippled through St George's Park. Heads dropped. The partnership that had animated the entire morning appeared finished.
Then Jansen reviewed.
The giant screen flashed the replay. Eyes followed the ball's journey. Silence gave way to anticipation.
No glove.
The decision was overturned.
The roar that followed felt louder than any boundary. Schoolchildren leapt from their seats. The band struck up again. Jansen survived.
And so did South Africa's momentum.
After two days in which rain had dictated every conversation, and broadcast crew creating their own games behind the pavilions in the indoor nets, the cricket out in the middle was finally telling the story. The sun shone, the band played, Bavuma battled and Jansen entertained.
By lunch, St George's Park felt transformed.
Not simply because the weather had changed, but because the old ground had rediscovered the ingredients it does better than almost anywhere else in the country: sunshine, noise, character and the irresistible feeling that something worth watching might just be about to happen.