Bad light wipes out 60 overs in Durban Test as ICC's new pink-ball fix sits unused
Bad light has done it again. A compelling first Test between South Africa and Australia in Durban has been repeatedly interrupted by gloom, with more than 60 overs wiped from the match across the first three days — just a week after the International Cricket Council changed the laws of the game to offer a way out.
Australia remain firmly in command of the contest, leading by 139 runs, but the tourists' advantage has been built on a match that keeps stopping early in the afternoon. On day one, play was halted at 15:23 local time with only 65.2 of the scheduled 90 overs bowled and the players unable to return. Day two lasted until 16:25, still 35 minutes earlier than it needed to be, and day three ended at 16:31.
On each occasion the first two sessions were played in hot, sunny conditions before clouds built in the afternoon.
Why Durban keeps losing the light
Kingsmead is staging its first October Test, and the schedule has been adjusted accordingly, with play starting early at 09:30 local time because the sun sets shortly after 18:00 at this time of year on South Africa's eastern coast.
The problem is not the hours available but the weather pattern filling them. BBC weather presenter Chris Fawkes explained the mechanics of Durban's afternoon cloud.
"Very quickly in the morning, as temperatures have risen inland as the sun heats the ground, a sea breeze has formed with winds coming from the sea into Durban," Fawkes said. "This has increased humidity levels through the morning and brought some cloud in. As temperatures have started to fall again towards the evening, this has increased the relative humidity with the air getting increasingly saturated. That has caused the cloud to get thicker and lower."
Under the laws of the game, Test play is suspended if the umpires decide the light is "dangerous or unreasonable" for the players.
What the ICC changed, and why it hasn't been used
Following a trial earlier in the year, the ICC amended its playing conditions last week to allow the pink ball to be used in Tests — a change designed for precisely these scenarios.
Crucially, the new condition does not permit a red ball to be swapped for a pink one mid-innings when the light fades, an idea previously floated by former England captain Michael Vaughan. Instead, if light problems are anticipated, it allows the two teams to agree before a Test begins to use the pink ball throughout.
No such discussions took place between South Africa and Australia before the Durban Test, so the match has continued with the red ball and the option has gone unused around the world.
'There is a stigma around the pink ball'
The pink ball has become a fixture of day-night Tests because it is easier to see than the darker red under floodlights. Former South Africa bowler Shaun Pollock, who sat on the ICC committee that recommended the change, believes the ball carries an unfair reputation.
"They say it moves too much," Pollock said. "If Australia were 124-6 [as they were on day one] and we were using the pink ball, everyone would have said it was the pink ball's fault. If Australia were 124-6 and got to 390 [as they did in their first innings] everyone in South Africa would have said it was the pink ball's fault, that it got soft."
Pollock's argument is straightforward: the pink ball would have kept the players on the field.
"The pink ball would have meant we played 45 more overs of Test cricket and that is why I am keen to introduce it, and not just for day-night games," he said.
Why teams hesitate — and the Australia factor
One narrative holds that the pink ball moves more under floodlights, though that is not backed up by ball-tracking data. Instead, several batters have spoken about the pink ball being harder to see, with batting averages lowest in the evening of day-night matches.
There is also a competitive dimension. Australia have played in 15 of Test cricket's day-nighters — 10 more than any other nation — and unsurprisingly the four leading wicket-takers in day-night matches are all Australians. Left-armer Mitchell Starc sits at the top of that list with 89 wickets in 15 Tests, making him the undisputed pink-ball king.
Any opponent might reasonably prefer to face Australia with the red ball rather than the pink.
Switch the ball mid-match? Philander's answer
Former South Africa bowler Vernon Philander favours the bolder option of changing balls during a match if conditions demand it, even though that would raise questions over the integrity of the contest — not least the injustice of one side having to face a pink ball while the other did not.
"They have to take it out of the hands of the players completed and enforce it from the umpires' point of view that the pink ball will become in play when the light has faded enough," Philander said. "You are always going to have the argument of who is ahead of the game. I would like to see the ICC enforce it on to the officials to make that call."
For now, the question remains unresolved: is the potential unfairness of a mid-match ball change outweighed by the need to keep cricket on the field? In Durban this week, the answer has been another early finish — and another afternoon of play lost to the light.