South Africa set for long hours of work with pink ball

For the next week, the South African squad will not be enjoying romantic sunsets with their other halves. Instead, at twilight, they want to be on the cricket field, preparing for their first day-night Test in the time frame they have identified as the trickiest to play with the pink ball.

As the natural light fades and artificial ones take over, the pink ball becomes what JP Duminy called “gloomy” and, so, more difficult to see. Duminy admitted the South African players, who have limited experience with the pink ball, don’t really understand whether the colouration of ball or the changing hues from the environment affect visibility but confirmed the contrast is significant. “It’s definitely a difference that you see, but I can’t give you the scientific reason why that is. We’ve still got to work that out.”

At dusk, the pink ball also starts to move a little more and so, for batsmen, survival in that period is key. “You’ve just got to fight through that phase,” Duminy said. “It’s obviously new to us, pink-ball cricket and day-night Test cricket. We’ve got to get used to it. And that’s why we wanted to bat as much as possible in that period during the warm-up game.”

For their warm-up match at the MCG on Saturday night, South Africa chose to bowl first to give their batsmen time in the middle when things got tough. The sun only set around 8pm – which will be the same as Adelaide – so the first hour of the final session is the most crucial. The second hour of that session takes place in complete darkness …

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