Kagiso Rabada made his way into the record books on Wednesday when he became the 4th highest wicket taker for South Africa, leapfrogging the legendary Allan Donald when he took a 5-wicket haul against Australia in the opening day of the World Test Championship final at Lord’s.
Rabada now has 332 wickets and is just behind (439), Shaun Pollock (421) and Makhaya Ntini (390) in the all time list. He also went past Morne Morkel for among SA bowlers at Lord’s with 18 wickets and became the third SA bowler with multiple five-fors at Lord’s after Allan Donald and Makhaya Ntini.
“Coming here about a week ago, could already feel the atmosphere. Great to see the support for us. Feels like a home game. Means a lot to play for South Africa. Given my all each and every time. Happy to do the job. It was moving around a bit. With the new ball it seemed harder to score. As the ball got softer and they showed intent, they got some runs away. But you always felt that, on this wicket, especially with the way they were playing, any ball had their name on it,” Rabada said in the mid-innings interview.
“That’s all secondary (climbing the wicket-takers list for SA). Primary is to keep running in and doing the job. Means a lot to get past Allan Donald, what a legend,” he added.
Rabada accounted for Usman Khawaja, Cameron Green, Beau Webster, Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc while Marco Jansen snapped up Marnus Labuschagne, Travis Head and Nathan Lyon as Australia were skittled out for 212 runs.
Earlier, led an Australia fightback to put the defending champions on 190-5 at tea. Smith scored 66 before being dismissed by part-time spinner Aiden Markram and featured in a 79-run fifth wicket partnership with Beau Webster as Australia steadied their innings after South Africa had taken four wickets before lunch.
Smith was playing for the first time since March and showed no signs of being rusty in a busy innings, continuing his form at Lord’s where he had previously scored a double century.
But he will be disappointed with the manner of his dismissal, attempting to slog Markram and getting a healthy edge to Marco Jansen at slip with the tall bowler juggling the ball twice before holding the catch.
