CAPE TOWN — The decision itself was not the problem. Bowl first at Newlands is a gamble, but it is a gamble that has worked often enough to be respectable. The problem was that England bowled as if the pitch owed them something.
For the first hour, the lengths were too full. For the next hour, they were too short. South Africa’s openers left the ball with the exaggerated care of men who had been told, repeatedly, that this was a difficult surface.
By the time Mark Wood found the edge, the score was 86 without loss and the sun was already climbing over Table Mountain. England’s attack spent the rest of the day chasing the game.
There were moments — Wood’s reverse swing, Bashir’s control through the middle session — but the scoreboard never quite stopped moving. England’s first-innings 412 was a fine effort. It just did not feel like enough.