The toss for the South Africa vs India, Boxing Day Test at SuperSport Park, Centurion has been delayed due to wet patches in the outfield. Rohit Sharma's men are chasing history as they eye an elusive series win in the Rainbow Nation. (Scorecard | Live Blog | Full Coverage)
There will be a ground inspection at 10 AM local time, that is 1:30 PM IST. As for the pitch report, Shaun Pollock and Ravi Shastri on-air say, "Good covering of grass. Teams tend to bat first because it tends to start a bit slow. As the Test progresses, there might be a bit of up-and-down movement which could be tricky to handle. Batting will get difficult as the Test progresses.
"With the weather conditions, South Africa would be tempted to go without a spinner. With the sun out, the pitch tends to crack a bit more and get the spinners into play. Don't expect the pitch to change too much across the Test. The best approach is to bat first, guts it out in the first two sessions and be happy if you're just 2 down at Lunch."
AccuWeather's weather forecast does not make a good reading. For Tuesday, there are 96 per cent chance of rain with thunderstorms. "Mainly cloudy with occasional rain and a thunderstorm." Centurion will experience thunderstorms between 7 and 9 am local time, before having a spell of heavy afternoon showers.
India haven't won a Test series in South Africa and remains their only frontier. Apart from wins in England, New Zealand, Australia and other countries, it will be a huge feat for Rohit Sharma and his men if they pull off a series win. This two-match series, for the record, is part of the ICC World Test Championship 2023-25.
News coming in from South African camp is that Kagiso Rabada is fit to play but Lungi Ngidi remains a doubt.
Squads:
India: Rohit Sharma (captain), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul (wk), Shreyas Iyer, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Mukesh Kumar, Prasidh Krishna, KS Bharat (wk), Abhimanyu Easwaran (2nd Test).
South Africa: Temba Bavuma (captain), Aiden Markram, Tony de Zorzi, Dean Elgar, Keegan Petersen, Kyle Verreynne (wk), Tristan Stubbs (wk), Nandre Burger, Marco Jansen, Wiaan Mulder, Gerald Coetzee, Keshav Maharaj, Kagiso Rabada, Lungi Ngidi, David Bedingham.
