South Africa Waste No Time In Finishing Off England

South Africa Waste No Time In Finishing Off England

Turned over: England were well beaten in the end by South Africa - here, on day three, Andrew Strauss ends up on the floor after dealing with a Morne Morkel bouncer.

©REUTERS/Philip Brown (SOUTH AFRICA - Tags: SPORT CRICKET) Picture Supplied by Action Images

South Africa 423-7 dec. (Smith 105, Boucher 95) beat
England 180 (Steyn 5-51) & 169 (Morkel 4-59) by an innings & 74 runs
Scorecard
Fourth Test, Johannesburg, day four

South Africa wasted little time in wrapping up an innings victory over England to level the series and retain the Basil D'Olivieira Trophy on day four of the fourth and final Test in Johannesburg.

After declaring on day three and reducing England to 48 for three overnight, Morne Morkel took four wickets as the home side dismissed England for 169 to hand the tourists their first defeat since August, when they were similarly beaten by an innings and 80 runs by Australia at Headingley.

Paul Collingwood, who batted England to draws at Centurion Park and Cape Town, excelled again by making a punchy 71 in 88 balls but he had little support and he was the only Englishman to pass 50 in the match having top scored with 47 in England's first-innings effort of 180 on the opening day.

Since then, they were chasing the game and Graeme Smith's 105 and Mark Boucher's 95 enabled South Africa to take advantage of some good luck with referrals and umpiring decisions to pile the pressure on England.

Unlike earlier in the series, when England were able to bat for lengthy periods of time to save games, the task was too big here with two days, thunderstorms notwithstanding, remaining and their second innings lasted just 42.5 overs in total as Morkel grabbed the wicket of Alastair Cook on day three followed by Ian Bell (5), Matthew Prior (0) and Stuart Broad (20) on the final morning.

Dale Steyn, Wayne Parnell and JP Duminy grabbed a couple of wickets apiece, Ryan Sidebottom the last man to fall for 15 when he was bowled by off-spinner Duminy.

England went into the match with a 1-0 lead courtesy of an innings victory in Durban.

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