Bending his back to deliver a knockout blow: Marco Jansen leaves India reeling in second Test

Basic, everyday life has to be a pain for Marco Jansen, one of the tallest players in modern-day cricket. One can only imagine how he would fit himself into an economy flight seat with his 2.06m frame.

The post-day media interaction on Monday, during the second Test between India and South Africa, gave a tiny glimpse of Jansen’s ‘troubles.’

Despite straining them to their maximum, the foldable mics in the press conference room failed to reach up to Jansen’s face, forcing him to crouch into an ungainly position. The proximity then caused him to unwittingly knock the mics off their position while gesturing with his hands.

For all the discomfort it creates, Jansen’s height also presents him with some unique advantages in the game of cricket, as India found out, yet again, in the Guwahati Test.

On Sunday, Jansen had batted India out of the game with a remarkable display of range hitting, cranking his way to a fiery 91-ball 93.

The 25-year-old returned on Monday to drive the advantage home, tormenting India with the ball now — the left-arm pacer skittled out six Indian batters with a match-defining bowling performance.

It was an exhibition of old-school short-ball strategy, enabled primarily by his height. More than a quarter of his 119 deliveries in the Indian innings were zoned in on the short length, a greater proportion than any other pacers from this Test.

The Indian batters struggled to put bat on ball against Jansen’s menacing rising deliveries, scoring just six runs from those 30 balls, expending four wickets in the process.

Jansen and fellow pacer Wiaan Mulder had begun the day targeting the good-length area. But with no lateral movement to work with, they were taken off after just seven overs for the spinners.

It was only in his second spell that Jansen began his bouncer barrage, wreaking havoc. He revealed that this wasn’t a ploy South Africa had schemed out earlier, but rather came up on the go.

“To be honest, we just said we’re going to try it. It wasn’t because their pacers also got some bounce. The ball wasn’t nipping or squatting as much in Kolkata. So we had to figure out a plan, and I think when I got my first wicket with a bouncer, we said, ‘Okay, cool, let’s see how long this is going to work, ’ and it just came off,” said Jansen.

The South African pacer, though, doesn’t believe the Indian batters have a specific vulnerability against the rising ball.

“I’ve played with Nitish Kumar [Reddy] at Sunrisers [Hyderabad]. I’ve seen him hit the short ball 50 rows back in IPL. I don’t think it’s a vulnerability thing. The game situation was very difficult. When your team’s a bit behind the eight ball, for any batter, that’s quite difficult to assess,” said Jansen.

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If the Indian batters sensed an added zest in Jansen’s bowling, it was probably a spillover of the confidence he had gained from his career-best Test knock on Sunday.

Thanks to his height, Jansen has the advantage of disrupting the bowlers’ length even before making a move. What would be a good-length delivery for an average batter would be a slot ball for him, and there were plenty of those for him in Guwahati.

Jansen walloped seven sixes and six fours during his career-best knock. It was an innings of such brute power-hitting that Jansen had to make a conscious effort to temper his surging adrenaline after the end of the day.

“Yesterday, when we went to the hotel, I just tried to switch off and tried to blow some steam off. So I called my family – my brother, sister, mom, dad, you name it. Just to get all those feelings and everything out,” added Jansen.

He had walked into bat with South Africa at 334 for seven, with a well-set Senuran Muthusamy at the crease.

Despite his team’s stable position, Jansen recollects that he was a nervous wreck and needed Muthusamy to calm him down.

“It’s funny because when I walked in. I think I faced three balls and Sen looked at me and said, ‘Just breathe. ’ I thought I was very calm, but clearly he just told me to breathe and that helped massively.”

A maiden Test hundred, though, fell through Jansen’s hands after he was bowled by Kuldeep Yadav while going for a single.

“I’ve never been in the 90s before in First-Class, never mind Tests. So I was definitely nervous. But I was nervous the whole way through. I think in retrospect, next time I’d rather get caught on the boundary than defending or trying to push it for one. That’s a learning that I take out of it,” added a smiling Jansen.

Despite missing out on a maiden Test ton, Jansen’s outing in Guwahati is already a landmark performance.

Only one pace-bowling all-rounder has ever scored more runs and taken more wickets in a Test in India than Jansen from this match – Ian Botham (114 runs and 13 wickets) in the iconic 1980 Wankhede Test.

With two more days of play remaining, Jansen has a real chance to get close to the legendary Botham in at least one of those counts. Not bad for someone who ‘struggles’ with a routine press conference.

Published on Nov 24, 2025