If history is any guide, South Africa are already out of this Test. In the first post-war Test at the SCG, Australia achieved a final-innings target of 214 for the loss of five wickets. Since then, no team has made as many as 175 to win batting last: in all likelihood, South Africa are condemned to add to that statistic. But who needs history as a guide when, like Justin Langer and Matt Hayden, you're busy making it? They now average 112.5 as an opening partnership from ten starts: only the eternal benchmark, Sir Jack Hobbs and Herbert Sutcliffe, who generated an average 114.7 in their first ten Test stands, have been so consistently crushing, and crushingly consistent.

Nor was today's partnership of 219 merely an entrenchment or vigil. After an awkward first half-hour, there was barely a pause let alone a lull: 30 fours and two sixes, composing 62% of their runs, were an indication both of the pair's assertiveness, and of the polished perfection of the outfield.

One manifestation of the Australians' dominance was in the treatment meted out when bowlers were introduced. When Claude Henderson came on before lunch, Langer hefted him at once into the crowd at mid-on. When Henderson resumed after lunch, Langer hop-scotched into a cover-drive to the boundary.

Allan Donald was recalled: Langer slashed through gully for four. Shaun Pollock introduced himself: Hayden walloped a long-hop over the mid-wicket fence. Jacques Kallis came back with ten minutes to tea: Hayden, heedless of the imminent break, flailed three consecutive boundaries. It was smart cricket: bowlers, like batsmen, are vulnerable when they first come in, or after an interruption. Kallis, bearing a heavier burden with the omission of Nantie Hayward, never settled. With an aim as errant as a blindfolded child playing pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey, he yielded 21 boundaries, mostly square of the wicket.

The value of the Langer-Hayden ascendancy was underscored when the visitors winkled out five wickets for 93 after tea on a pitch which, like last season's, is already showing signs of premature erosion and sometimes discomfiting bounce. Pollock moved the second new ball far more than the first, and more than at any stage of the series, probably by bowling a little slower and a little fuller. But Australia's score already appears unassailable, and it is clear, even without consulting old Wisdens, that the last innings here will be a daunting assignment.

Gideon Haigh is one of Australia's leading cricket writers and the author of several books including The Summer Game, the acclaimed history of Australian cricket from 1948 to 1971.

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