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South Africa ate up another session in their epic bid to save the Delhi Test, losing only one wicket in the process. Ravindra Jadeja dismissed Hashim Amla, for 25 off 244 balls, in the 13th over of the morning, before AB de Villiers and Faf du Plessis saw South Africa through to lunch with an unbroken stonewalling partnership spanning 22.1 overs.

In all, South Africa made 22 runs as 35 overs blurred past them in the first session of day five. By lunch, the pitch had slowed down considerably, but unpredictable bounce was becoming far more frequent. Umesh Yadav, coming back for his second spell late in the session, got three balls to rear at de Villiers in the space of two overs, and knocked his bat out of his hands by smacking his top hand once and his bottom hand on the other occasion.

Umesh's lifters were a reminder to South Africa of how hard their task still was. They have two more sessions to bat out in the day, a minimum of 55 overs that India's bowlers are sure to exceed given their over rate.

India had a 72-over-old ball at the start of the day, and the first eight overs were shared among the two seamers - who tried, with little success, to unsettle Amla and de Villiers from around the wicket - the occasional leg-rollers of Virat Kohli, and the never-before-seen legbreaks of Cheteshwar Pujara. India were waiting to bring their spinners on when the second new ball was available. With the pitch slowing down considerably, they were banking on getting some life out of it with a harder ball with a prominent seam.

Jadeja produced the wicket-taking ball in his third over, drawing Amla forward with flight, and getting the ball to drift into him and spin away sharply. For once, Amla's front-foot stride was short and insufficient to get close to the pitch of the ball, which beat his outside edge and clipped the outside of his off stump.

An air of expectation hung around the middle over the course of Jadeja's next few overs, with Jadeja producing a loud lbw shout by beating du Plessis with a slider and then producing an edge that fell just short of slip.

Eventually, du Plessis settled down, proving himself a worthy recipient of South Africa's blocking baton. Amla had taken 46 balls to get off the mark, and de Villiers 33. Du Plessis bested both of them, taking 53 balls to get his first run, a pushed single into the covers off an R Ashwin full toss. Du Plessis went to lunch on 2 off 61 balls while de Villiers was on 26 off 203.

By then, Ashwin had tried everything - a fuller length to try and exploit footmarks outside the off stump, only to be stymied by the South Africans' refusal to drive, legbreaks and carrom balls, and a switch to around the wicket.

At the other end, Jadeja produced an unceasingly metronomic performance. He kept wheeling in, kept attacking the stumps, and the batsmen kept defending stubbornly. His figures at the start of the day were 23-16-10-0. At lunch, they were 35-28-10-1.

Karthik Krishnaswamy is a senior sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.

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ELECTRIC_LOCO_WAP4 ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:30 GMT

No comparisons of our Umesh with likes of Holding,Thommo,Johnson,Lee,Waqar yet? After he 'hit' AB-3 times now-taking off a length at 138 kph. I'm surprised!

CARLWHYTE ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:29 GMT

THERIPPER ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 7:42 GMT @CARLWHYTE - That's why we love paying Australia, they would have been all out by tea yesterday, even on this dead wicket playing their attacking brand of cricket

^^ Everyone loves to beat Australia, funny thing though India have never won a test series in Australia, so I'm sure their fans love it when India tours.

KULAPUTRA ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:23 GMT

Test cricket at its best. Love it.

VAISHAK13 ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:23 GMT

South Africa can be proud of this..ur in a battlefield, u have run out of ammunition, what do u do? Run against the enemy with bare arms or shield ur life till truce?..3-0 I believe wud put an even bigger dent in their test points than 2-0..

AJOURNEYER ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:19 GMT

Resistance is great but South Africa really blocked way too much.

ELECTRIC_LOCO_WAP4 ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:18 GMT

Playing 'street smart' cricket has not been SA's big strength,and has proved to be their bane many time,esp. in big tourneys.It can be as simple a thing as taking a single-'03 wc-or denying 1,which AB did'nt do,thereby exposing Duminy to Ashwins end.

JACOBCHIKKU ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:18 GMT

This is why we should prepare tracks with more assistance for Spin!!

IRFAN.SRINAGAR.KASHMIR ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:17 GMT

Why do indian fans think it is boring, right now their job at hand is to pick up wickets, why should south african batting bother them, fours and sixes will not entertain indian fans at all its just the desperation to win from where these comments are popping out, probably more because the true color of indian spinners eventually could not be hid on a slightly better wicket. From south african point of view why should they bother whether it is dead defence or fours and sixes as long as they can draw, had they gone for it even from the beginning of the chase at some point india could have stopped the runflow by

defensive tactics anyways, therefore for sa-cans it makes no difference to draw the match making 150 odd runs than finishing at 350 odd plus the greater chances of losing the match. How can an opponent question the strategy of other team, what is the match then for?

THERIPPER ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:14 GMT

This is why we need rank turners when playing in India. On normal Indian wickets if teams like SA decide to play for a draw then it's difficult to get them out due to the slow nature of tracks. It's easier with teams like Australia as they are always going to attack no matter what the situation.

BIBIN THOMAS ON DECEMBER 7, 2015, 8:04 GMT

Vilas's SR has reached normal levels now