South Africa v Australia: second men’s cricket Test, day two – live

This was the risk of Test cricket in October, we’re told by South Africans. More likely to have bad weather. In 2018, of course, this tour was played in March and even strayed into the first days of April. Seven of the last eight Australian visits started in February or March. But that can’t happen anymore, because that would displease the IPL, whose owners want Australian players, and would displease Australian players who want to earn the extra slice from the IPL.

Well, perhaps more importantly it would deny that same chance to South African players, who need that extra payday much more urgently given how little they comparatively earn from their home board, or more realistically it would see a Test series shorn of anyone who got picked up by the IPL.

Does the rain mean we’re doomed to have a draw? Not necessarily, given the speed at which Test cricket moves in this era. Even in Durban, which was an uncharacteristic grind of a match relative to many recently, they only played about 360 of a possible 450 overs. All the time lost to bad light didn’t matter, and it wasn’t a close-run thing to finish the game on day five. If wickets keep falling when we get some play, the rain may not matter. But that’s only if it clears up and stays away after this morning.

Hello all. Yes, we managed 12.2 overs yesteday, but somehow it was still quite an eventful 12.2 overs. Another chapter in the Scott Boland story, anyway. He’s a quiet testament to humility. Very odd that CA didn’t put him up to speak to media last night. They didn’t put anyone up, which is highly unusual.

The bad news for those wanting the next chapter of this tale is that it’s still raining in Gqeberha. So the planned early start won’t happen, nor will the normal start on time, nor will anything probably for the first couple of hours. The forecast is better later, and even yesterday we were anticipating losing the morning.

Geoff will be here shortly. In the meantime, here’s what happened on a soggy day one at St George’s Park: