South Africa vs England: Resurgent Steve Finn allows tourists to close in on victory

England’s renascent fast bowler Steve Finn simply did the simple things well today to make what might be the crucial late breakthrough on the fourth day of the first Test here.

The ball he produced to dismiss Faf du Plessis ended a stubborn, potentially insurmountable partnership. It was fast, accurate and bounced awkwardly off a length, meaning that Du Plessis had to play a shot that he had little hope of controlling.

The upshot, a hard edge, was clung on to by Alastair Cook at slip and it reinstated England as favourites to take the lead in the series, with South Africa ending the day on 136 for 4 – 280 runs adrift.

“We’re in a fantastic position to try and press home for that victory,” said Finn, who joined the touring party as a late addition after recovering earlier than anticipated from a stress fracture of the foot. “The rewards we got today were born through patience and hard work.

“A lot of that session we were trying to build pressure and some of the guys were bowling within themselves.

“But at the drinks break before those couple of overs I had at the end, Stuart Broad and [bowling coach] Ottis Gibson said to me to just bowl as quick as I could and hit the deck as hard as I could. I ran in as hard as I could and, luckily, I got a bit more bounce.”

It takes height and pace to extract such bounce, of course, and even for Finn it is intermittent from the Umgeni End here at Kingsmead. Low bounce may be a factor on the fifth and final day as well, and off-spinner Moeen Ali can expect to bowl the bulk of the overs from the other end.

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It was Moeen who was deprived of the key wicket of the talismanic AB de Villiers, who resumes on 37 this morning, when Jonny Bairstow missed a stumping chance late in the day. The ball turned appreciably, deceiving wicketkeeper as well as batsman, but it is the sort of chance that England must take to win this opening match.

“We back ourselves to get these wickets,” said Finn. “We have to create chances and half-chances, we didn’t take one of those half-chances unfortunately but it doesn’t matter who gets them.

“If we come out either expecting to get wickets or trying too hard to get wickets, that will stand against us. If we are patient and let South Africa come to us, then we have a very good chance.

“De Villiers averages over 50 runs in Test cricket so he is a very important player for them, he’s one of the best in the world, but as long as we get wickets, we don’t care which six we get.”

Of Bairstow’s missed opportunity, Finn sympathised, saying: “It spun hard, he was unsighted – I think, through the bat and the pad. No one in the dressing room is blaming him at all, he works very hard on his keeping and hopefully we’ll get the next one.”

As for his now-repaired left foot, Finn said: “It wasn’t ideal to go home from Dubai [from the Test series against Pakistan] with that stress fracture but it gave me a chance to rest the rest of my body. I was parked up on the sofa for a long time.

“There has been no pain or anything, so I’m just trying to enjoy it and savour these great occasions. As much as scoring runs is a nice knack for a batsman, taking wickets is a nice knack to have as a bowler. I feel a far better bowler than I was five years ago when I first played international cricket.”

England have three sessions to wrap things up today, weather permitting, and South Africa’s Dane Piedt admitted: “The batters coming in, we’re really going to have to knuckle down and try and take it as long as possible.”