The spinners wrapped up England's flimsy tail, and Dennis Lillee made the vital breakthroughs in the second innings, but it was Malcolm Marshall's devastating burst on the second evening that put the result of this match beyond all reasonable doubt. With 16 wickets in the series already, Marshall was at the top of his game as the teams arrived at Newlands and, as our graph shows, he made every ball count. His metronomic off-stump line, allied to some appreciable movement both ways and the occasional wicked bouncer, proved too good for England's top order – and four wickets tumbled for 48 runs in the space of 18 overs.

Of Marshall's 108 deliveries in the first innings, a phenomenal 82% of them pitched on or just outside off stump. Just five balls strayed any wider of that line, though one of those was good enough to account for Graham Gooch, who slashed wildly at what he thought was a rare bad one. Another ten balls (9%) were speared in at middle stump, including the crushing yorker that accounted for Ted Dexter, and just four deliveries in all strayed anywhere near leg stump. Two of these, however, were venomous short balls to Colin Cowdrey, who twice had the temerity to steal edged boundaries to third man.

Andrew Miller is editorial assistant of Wisden.com.

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