When you're more than two metres tall, with a moustache the size of caterpillar on your top lip, and can consistently bowl in the 140s, it's going to be difficult to convince people that you're the nervous type, but Marco Jansen is. Or maybe was.
Jansen is now the bowler who has taken the joint-fewest number of deliveries to complete a Test-match seven-for: 41. He did this in an explosive spell of movement and bounce that tested the Sri Lanka's batters' techniques and ripped them apart. And he did it without the kind of vein-popping aggression that a bowler doing that kind of damage may employ. Jansen is not really that kind of player. He is unassuming, shy, and can get down on himself, even when it's clear he has all the ingredients to go down as one of the greats.
Take the ball that beat Dhananjaya de Silva's defence. It moved just enough to swerve through the bat-pad gap. It was full, but not too full. De Silva wanted to drive and got an inside-edge, and Jansen was rewarded with the dreamy sight of the stumps shattering behind the batter. Two overs later, he had Angelo Mathews reaching for a ball off the back foot and getting a thick outside edge to first slip. The most excited person on the field was Tristan Stubbs, who whooped from third slip and jumped on his team-mates. Jansen was perhaps pensively considering the magnitude of what he had done: removed Sri Lanka's two most experienced batters to put South Africa in a position to stamp their authority on the game. He bowled his next few overs buoyed with a different kind of confidence; a far cry from the player who, just a year ago, was a shadow of this.
Remember last year's 50-over World Cup where Jansen was South Africa's new-ball ace before they ran into India and he got the yips? Well, he admitted that he had needed, before the match, a chat with his father and a few Bible verses to calm himself down. Seven months later, he had to play India again, in the T20 World Cup final, and was South Africa's most expensive bowler in a match that has been archived alongside other ghosts of tournaments past.
He went on to play in Major League Cricket (MLC) but, on his return home, not only was he carrying a shoulder niggle but also mental fatigue. Cricket South Africa (CSA) recognised the need to put him on an extended break. They have explained these as "conditioning blocks" intended to address a variety of issues associated with the modern game, including, but not limited to, too much of it. And the time away has left Jansen "a lot more refreshed" and ready to perform under pressure again.
"It's similar to the physical; it feels like I can go for longer periods of time and concentrate at a higher level, which is what you ultimately want as a cricket player, especially in Test cricket," he said at the post-day-two press conference in Durban.
So yes, there's a difference between this Test match and the two examples mentioned above. This match isn't being played in front of a partisan and passionate crowd, and it's not a final, but South Africa were bowled out for 191 at a ground where their recent history is poor. Though the pitch was not the spinner-friendly sort it had been in 2019, when Sri Lanka last won here, batting conditions were testing and Sri Lanka's seamers exposed South Africa's inexperience. Add to that that they also lost a bowler, Wiaan Mulder, while he was batting and two of the other three seamers - Jansen and Gerald Coetzee - had both not played a Test in almost a year, and that was reason to be concerned.
By the fourth over, any lingering worries would have started to evaporate. Both new-ball bowlers had wickets and Sri Lanka's batters were being forced to play at deliveries they may otherwise have left because of the lengths South Africa were bowling. "We assessed that the fuller ball or the ball that hits the stumps three-quarters of the way up, was easier to play even though the ball was nipping," Jansen said. "Whereas when we bowl a length that hit the top of the stumps or higher, the ball has a longer time to move. After the first five wickets fell in our innings, we saw that that particular area was a good length. And then it's just a case of making the batters play. If the batters leave well on length and in line, then it doesn't particularly matter where you bowl. But if you can try and make them play as much as possible, then you're always in the game."
It could be argued that four of Sri Lanka's top seven could have left the deliveries they chose to go after and three of those - Pathum Nissanka, Mathews and de Silva - were against Jansen. A fourth, Dinesh Chandimal, had his defences breached both because he failed to close the bat-pad gap and because Jansen got the ball to move just enough to find a way through.
Does that mean Kingsmead is on its way to regaining its reputation for the green mamba rather than the subcontinent-like substitute? "The groundsman said the wicket was going to have a bit of pace and consistent bounce," Jansen said. "Seeing the grass yesterday, we thought the new ball was going to have an effect and then spin might come into the game quicker. But by the looks of it, I think we can strike with the new ball and make it count, I don't think there's going to be a lot of overs of spin."
Keshav Maharaj did not bowl at all in Sri Lanka's first innings, which only lasted 13.5 overs, but Prabath Jayasuriya has sent down 20 overs and has already taken four wickets. "The ball is turning," Jansen said. "So I wouldn't be surprised if Temba [Bavuma, South Africa's captain] brings Kesh on and sees what happens."
There's much cricket to be played between now and South Africa bowling again, including Bavuma's second innings. Jansen equated his first-innings 70 with the value of a century because it was "crucial, especially with the ball seaming around and nipping around."
Bavuma was batting on the first day, when South Africa expected it to move around. They were pleasantly surprised that it did the same on the second, helped by overnight rain which the Test has (hopefully) seen the last of. But it wasn't only the conditions that they took advantage of. "We bowled really well in terms of our intensity and the energy of the ball, because we realised that the ball was moving nice and quick off the pitch, which is always what we want as bowlers," Jansen said.
He used "we" because it was a collective effort but he was a major part of that, and he might still be too modest to say so. Since coming back from this period of forced rest and rehabilitation, Jansen played eight games before this Test with a best return of 3 for 34 in a domestic T20. Like everyone in South Africa's attack, the T20Is against India were punishing but he was their most economical bowler. A noticeable difference is how much more he seems to trust his own skills and how much more aggressive he is in his approach. All of that contributed to his 7 for 13 on Thursday, and while those figures may be scarcely believable, they will give him belief for a long time to come.