Aparajita Ray
08 July, 2025:
During the second and final Test of the series at Queens Sports Club, Bulawayo, in the South Africa Tour of Zimbabwe, the South Africa (SA) Captain Wiaan Mulder etched his name in history books. He became the second South African to score a triple century after Hashim Amla (311*) in 2012.
In the first Test match of the series, the stand-in captain Keshav Maharaj was ruled out of the series due to a left groin strain. Hence, Wiaan Mulder stepped up as the stand-in captain in the second Test. At the toss, Zimbabwe won it and chose to field first and give the visitors a chance to put the score on the board. The Zimbabwe bowlers quickly took wickets of the SA openers Tony de Zorzi (10) and Lesego Senokwane (3). Then, Captain Mulder and David Bedingham had a huge partnership of 184 runs, where Bedingham got out at 82 runs. Mulder continued his skill and another partnership made 217 runs with Lhuan-dre Pretorius and quick partnerships with Dewald Brevis of 88 runs in the fifth-wicket partnership and with Kyle Verreynne, where he scored 42 runs. On Day 2 Lunch, Mulder declared SA’s innings at 626 for five wickets, where he scored a massive run of 367 runs and stayed unbeaten. Wiaan made many milestones in this innings, like his knock being renamed as the highest individual score by a player in Test cricket history away from home. He also became the highest scorer on captaincy debut in Test format and the first player to score a triple century in their first game as captain.
In an interview with Shaun Pollock where he explained the reason why he declared the innings and not trying to touch 400 mark; firstly they put huge score on the board hence they need to bowl and moreover Brian Lara’s 400 runs innings was legendary and he also thinks that Brian Lara’s knock should keep the record exactly the way it is in.
On Day 2, Zimbabwe’s 1st innings were bowled out in 170 runs and the match was stumped with a follow-on to Zimbabwe and again with a wicket down.
