South African captain Graeme Smith and coach Micky Arthur had additional reasons to rejoice after their team's crushing victory.
AHEMABAD: South African captain Graeme Smith and coach Micky Arthur had additional reasons to rejoice after their team's crushing victory over hosts India in the second Test at the Motera stadium that put the visitors 1- 0 ahead in the three-Test series.
By leading his team to South Africa's biggest-ever winning margin over India, Smith joined former captain, the late Hansie Cronje, as the Proteas' most successful Test captain.
While Smith has led South Africa on 56 occasions with 27 victories, 15 losses and four draws, Cronje -- tainted by the match-fixing scandal and later banned for life after he accepted taking money to underperform before dying in a plane crash -- led the Rainbow nation in 53 matches. Of these, South Africa had won 27 and lost 11.
The visiting team's thumping innings victory in Ahmedabad on Saturday also bettered their win-loss record in Tests on Indian soil to a creditable 4-3 ahead of the final Test at Kanpur.
Saturday's victory was also South Africa's biggest winning margin against India, bettering the innings and 71 runs that Cronje's team achieved at Bangalore in 2000, incidentally the scam-tainted player's last match as captain which helped his team complete a 2-0 series win.
That was also the last occasion that India lost a home Test match by an innings.
South Africa coach Arthur has now completed 28 matches in charge of the Proteas and has a 50 per cent success ratio.
Among the individual records set here was the fifth-wicket partnership of 256 between Jacques Kallis (132) and A B de Villiers (217 not out) which has become the highest by South Africans for any wicket against India.
Pace bowler Dale Steyn, who played a major role in the stunning victory by taking eight wickets in the match to the four taken in the drawn series opener at Chennai, took his tally in the sub-continent to 35 from six Tests.
He has a total of 75 wickets from the last eleven Tests, which includes two 10-wicket feats.
Meanwhile, the team has decided to take a complete break from the game Sunday and Monday before proceeding to Kanpur on Tuesday, according to the Cricket South Africa's travelling media officer, Michael Owen-Smith.
The squad will have practice in Kanpur on Wednesday morning and Thursday afternoon, he added.
The soundly thrashed Indian team also had an off day and are scheduled to have a lengthy practice session at the Sardar Patel Gujarat Stadium nets.
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