SA close in on Tigers' lead

Right before the players left the field for the last time yesterday Mushfiqur Rahim called up Jubair Hossain and had a quick word with him near the wicket. By the looks of it, he was seemingly showing the leg-spinner the rough areas on the pitch; trying to map the zones where the youngster could perhaps get a bit more assistance from.

The minute-long act was nothing out of the ordinary. However, in a way, it depicted a sense of frustration. That the visitors left the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium for the day without losing a wicket, 61 for no loss, and just 17 runs behind would have definitely irritated him.

After all, it isn't a very common scenario for Bangladesh to take lead after their first innings. In fact, the 78-run lead attained by the hosts -- after getting bowled out for 326 in 116.1 overs -- is their highest ever while batting second in a Test match.

And to see three-fourths of that lead getting wiped out by the end of the day must have hurt them. However, the captain would be more disappointed with his batsmen rather than his bowlers, for none of them managed to make the most of their starts.

Mushfiqur himself continued his lean patch in Test cricket, after he got trapped in front by Dale Steyn. A fierce in-swinging delivery beat Mushfiqur's bat and rammed his pads. While the skipper and the on-field umpire seemed to suggest that there was an inside edge, the    Decision Review System went against him.

Mushfiqur has now failed to post a 50-plus score in his last ten Test innings. Only once did he go through such a disappointing streak and that was in 2008, two-and-a-half years after he began his career.

The nervous period, following Mushfiqur's dismissal though was calmly seen off courtesy of an 82-run stand between Shakib Al Hasan and Litton Das for the sixth wicket. Both batsmen played cautious knocks and focused more on the singles. In fact, the first seven overs of their partnership saw them just nudge deliveries around a bit. It was only after Stiaan van Zyl was brought in that Shakib decided to up the tempo. He pulled and drove one back past the bowler for two consecutive boundaries in the 81st over.

Skipper Hashim Amla retorted by bringing in both his frontline bowlers Vernon Philander and Morne Morkel after that. And that move again led to a dry spell for the batsmen, as the bowlers kept a tight leash. They barely provided the batsmen with any room to free their hands.

The only odd boundaries that came were courtesy of some brilliant on-drives from Litton. The youngster, who seems to love the hits down the leg-side, beautifully timed one over mid-wicket in the 85th over when Morkel bowled one on the middle and leg.

His best shot of the day, an easy-going straight drive against Steyn in the 93rd over took the hosts past South Africa's total. A few overs after that, Shakib decided that he was going to take on the bowlers and smacked a few short deliveries from Simon Harmer and JP Duminy for boundaries over mid-wicket. However, he ended up paying for that intent as a similar delivery from Harmer -- a slightly short-ball -- saw him sky the ball for an easy catch at mid-wicket in the 103rd over. He was gone for 47.

The wicket came against the run of play and suddenly the hosts, who were at that point of time looking good to reach their target of 400 runs, realised that they didn't have any more batsmen to come in.

Aware of that fact, Mohammad Shahid, who came in next, decided to go all guns blazing and smacked Harmer for three fours and a six in over number 104. It was something that perhaps no one, including the Bangladeshi contingent would have expected.

The first one was an edge, the second one was a down-the-track hit, the third beat mid-wicket, while the fourth boundary went all the way back over the bowler's head.

He even smacked the dangerous Philander for a boundary, before getting caught on the boundary in the same over for an entertaining 25.

Meanwhile, Litton fell a ball after reaching his maiden half-century in the 109th over. Harmer got some extra turn from the wicket which surprised the batsman and got him caught behind.

After that it was all about survival. Steyn was brought in and he knocked down Taijul Islam and Mustafizur Rahman to take his total tally of wickets to 399.

After the exchange, van Zyl and Dean Elgar negotiated 21.1 overs successfully and set a good foundation for what is expected to be an exciting last two days.

The match was interrupted due to rain twice. The first interruption was from 12:10 to 12:40 pm while the second was at 4:21 pm, after which play was ultimately called off for the day.