Pace-off ploy: How Marco Jansen and Lungi Ngidi befuddled India’s batters

He did not pick a wicket, but the pressure he created with his cutters and the pace-off deliveries into the surface suffocated the power-packed Indian batting line-up; as a result, bowlers around him feasted on wickets. His partner in crime, Marco Jansen, who also resorted to pace-off as his go-to weapon on the night, was the main beneficiary of Ngidi’s disguises. Apart from the second over of the innings, which Jansen bowled, and the ninth over, which Ngidi bowled, the remaining three overs of their spells, Markram used them together, letting them hunt in pairs with the relentless off-cutters, leg-cutters, moon balls and knuckle balls into the surface.

Stats of India batters against pace on and pace off deliveries. (Credit: Cricket 21)

Abhishek Sharma was the first prey of the slower ball blueprint. Ngidi bowled a tight fourth over of the innings, conceding three runs, and Jansen applied further squeeze, mixing it up and slipping in the knuckle ball, which Sharma tried to flick through mid-wicket, skying it and getting caught. The second instance came when Hardik Pandya and Shivam Dube’s partnership was just blossoming, after they played a couple of satisfying overs against Kagiso Rabada and Keshav Maharaj. The duo came back in the 13th and 14th overs, with the older ball this time, and gave away just 11 runs to hard-hitters. The momentum was broken with deception in pace, and the run-rate spiked as a result, with India needing 102 from 36 balls, and the follow-up over from Maharaj yielded three wickets, which buried the Indian hopes on the night.

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The final act came when Dube was trying to throw back some punches, and Ngidi came back to bowl a miserly three-run 18th over to the southpaw. Jansen got the fruits of the labour this time, with the wicket of Dube and Jasprit Bumrah, to end India’s misery on the night slowly.

A batting line-up which looked strong and flexible not too long ago has shown signs of brittleness and weakness against pace-off deliveries. This was not something which happened for the first time in the tournament either. When India played the USA on the opening night, it was an unusual Wankhede pitch where the surface behaved two-paced. Shadley van Schalkwyk, who is a military medium, got four wickets on the night. The warning signs of struggles against slower balls were on display that evening.

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As Schalkwyk rolled his fingers over, bowled knuckle and cross-seamer deliveries dug into the surface, Indian batters Tilak Varma and Dube were prematurely committed to play the ball through the leg-side. Both were undone by the pace, ending up getting caught inside the ring, with Tilak getting the ball on the splice, and Dube getting the top edge. A few dropped chances from the USA, and a sensational 49-ball 84 run knock from Surya saved the day for the defending champions that night, but the hosts did not have a similar fate against South Africa.

Surya did acknowledge that the pitches have been trickier. “Expectation is to make 220, 240, 250. But wickets are a little different here. The four wickets we have played on so far were a little different and challenging,” he said. And South Africa has given other teams a map to counter the Indian lineup on these “different” wickets.