Zimbabwe vs South Africa | 2nd Test | 6-10 July | Bulawayo

[Googly]

If Mulder breaks the world record here its going to be uncomfortable for ZC, nothing they won't cope with though. Take nothing away from the guy, he's played beautifully and faced some outstanding deliveries along the way, but there's been some shite as well.

[zimbos_05]

Wow, this is an unmitigated disaster. A national embarrassment.

Well - the chickens are well and truly coming home to roost. Years and years of mismanagement by the board, siphoning off of funding, racial discrimination and racist selection policies, neglect of the grass roots, and downright incompetence have done us good. TBH I'm surprised this hasn't happened sooner.

SA to post 700+ I think.

It did happen sooner. When we lost to Singapore, and then the UAE, then Scotland, then Uganda.

It's happened multiple times. Those were papered over and a white guy was blamed for it. This time it's worse because of how easy it is. Not a single player putting their hand up. When we played England, everyone was all, "oh, what an amazing feeling this is, who cares about the result. Well done Mukhulani for making this happen".

This is the reality though. Will anything change? Not a chance in hell. More white people will be blamed and the cycle will continue.

[zimbos_05]

A strike rate of over 100 in a test match, and a run rate closer to 6. These players should be issuing public apologies.

[Googly]

When they eventually declare, we will go out there and bat at like 1.76RR and get bowled out for under 200 or something. It's clear the guys have already lost. Mulder has mentally destroyed them.

It's embarrassing having 2 players score such high scores against us in the modern era.

What about Gill against England?

[CrimsonAvenger]

While I understand the pain and also all the observations about mismanagement over the years, we need to remember the last time someone broke Lara’s 375 record against us - Hayden’s 380 - we had a bowling line up boasting Streak, Blignaut, Price and Sean Ervine. Things can go horribly wrong on their day even with better teams. Just to keep things in perspective.

[TapsC2]

This has to be the same pitch Afghanistan scored 699 and had 2 double centurions. I think there were 6 centurions in that game with over 1400 runs scored over 5 days. Bennett got his maiden century. Preparing a similar pitch against much better opposition than you is suicidal. This Bulawayo test experiment has to stop.

I would rather we have a situation like the West Indies against Australia now. The margin of defeat is a lot smaller because the pitch has life in it. Also in those kind of games it takes one guy to have a good day to potentially get a result.

Worst part about it I think the South Africans have read the pitch correctly again and gone with an extra spinner.

[TapsC2]

Every wicket cost 100 runs in that boxing day test. Why on earth would you want to play a game like that? Our batsmen better not embarrass us and be bundled out for 200

[Googly]

Good observations.

[Ming]

Apparently SA have declared according to cricinfo...why they wouldn't want to push for the record is a mystery...

[Pat_Bee]

They'll use Sammons and Ervine as the scapegoats. That's the usual MO

Nah, it's all down to Ian Smith

He’d still be there farming the strike into the last half hour of day 5. Stubbornly batting for 15 hours and ultimately coming undone when the end was in sight. Wisden almanac would question his captaincy for sure but would look back favourably on his grit and fight with the bat.