England set the Proteas wobbling in the first session of the Test series

South Africa were put on the back foot very early when Jimmy Anderson struck first ball after England captain Joe Root won the toss and opted to field.

Root raised some eyebrows by putting the Proteas in but opener Dean Elgar gave England a late Christmas gift and the perfect start to the series for the tourists.

England rewarded for bold move

Anderson started down the leg side and Elgar couldn’t help prodding at it, taking a slight edge through to Jos Buttler. Elgar became the fourth South African after Eddie Barlow, Jimmy Cook and Gary Kirsten to lose their wicket off the first ball of the Test.

That brought Zubayr Hamza to the wicket to face Anderson before Elgar’s partner Aiden Markram could get on strike.

Hamza looked reasonably comfortable at the crease on a surface that played well by contrast Markram looked unsure in defence and prone to go after anything that was either short or wide.

Markram and Hamza put on 32 for the second wicket before the former allowed his desire to attack to get the better of him.

Having struck 20 off 22 balls, the 23rd ball Markram faced would be his last as he chipped Sam Curran, bowling his first over, to Jonny Bairstow at midwicket.

The arrival of Faf du Plessis at the wicket brought some solidity and the skipper and Hamza looked good, and it seemed as though they might be able to steer the Proteas to lunch just two down, which they might have claimed as a moral victory.

Hamza played some glorious strokes in his innings, but he will be disappointed with the way he got out prodding at a decent delivery from Stuart Broad with hard hands and seeing it fly to Ben Stokes in the slips. Hamza’s 39 led the scoring for the Proteas in a tough first session.

The new man in was Rassie van der Dussen charged with surviving a tricky twenty minute spell before lunch with his skipper.

Du Plessis and van der Dussen survived despite a big shout for leg before when Archer struck the Proteas captain on his back pad, the umpire wasn’t interested and England refused the review which proved wise with the ball tracking showing the delivery would miss the stumps.

All three Proteas dismissals were marked by errors from the batsmen rather than brilliant bowling and stress the work that needs to be done to improve the team’s fortunes in Test cricket.

The Proteas were 79/3 at the lunch break.