Another perfect day for cricket in Melbourne,a damp overcast morning and remaining overcast nearly all day the sun peeping through only for a couple of short periods.
It appeared the ball was swinging a bit and the pitch may have had a green tinge to it.
Quiney put together another great innings of 19 before he played too early, TDean then played too late. Handscomb was looking good before he and Stoinis were beaten by the swing. Finch left the ball and was possibly unlucky to be LBW ,it may have been going over the stumps.
Maxwell was the star always attacking and 3 consecutive 4's off Sayers being the highlight.
Christian got a leading edge probably getting carried by Maxwell scoring so freely and tried to the same instead of just turning over the strike. Hasting had an entertaining slog when Maxwell went out, as Vics were playing 3 number 11 batsmen
SA only used the 3 bowlers before lunch and Zampa had one over the end before Hastings was caught on the boundary.
Sayers was hit for 4 just about every over, Mennie bowled tightly, Worrall just seems to have a knack of being able to get people out.
Cooper and Cosgrove got off to a good start , Cosgrove being fairly adventurous. Hastings was off after 2 overs as was Tremain.
After tea Tremain had a tremendous burst probably due to swinging the ball. Cooper nicked off , Ferguson beaten , Cosgrove then went into his shell. Just when he hit some runs to bring up his 50 he had a shocking swat a short one from Tremain.
Head was busy, looked in touch. Lehmann looked ok but couldn't get the ball away for runs. Hasting did for both probably with a bit of away swing.
Ahmed was only brought on late in the day and as usual went for a few runs with Ross trying to sweep everything till he completely misjudged one and was out LBW, possibly unlucky but he deserved it after trying play the shot he did.
Zampa came in and has no hesitation hitting Ahmed around.
Stoinis just gave up runs, Boland was tight as usual got a couple of edges late in the day.
The Duke came back to his usual self in his second spell.
Other highlights
Due to the damp outfield there were 2 allrun 4's early on in the Vics innings.
After Head top edged Tremain for four, Tremain bowled one that was about 10 foot over the keeper's head, landed two/thirds of the way to boundary and went for 4 byes.
Handscomb the Victorian keeper was wearing his pads under his trousers. Is this now common ?