England and Essex captain Nasser Hussain led from the front in the Second Test against South Africa with a resilient unbeaten 70 that saw him occupy the crease for five hours in a performance that staved off the threat of defeat, to earn his side an honourable draw.

The result leaves the series very much alive with South Africa 1-0 ahead although a number of contentious umpiring decisions, the majority of which favoured the home side, almost permitted the host country to double their lead in the series ahead of the next Test which starts in Durban on Boxing Day.

Batting at number three, Hussain is currently enjoying a rich vein of form that saw him score a magnificent 82 in the First innings before guiding his side to safety in his second knock of the game.

He had warmed up for this match with a century against Kwazulu-Natal in the preceding game to become the first England player to score a century this year.

The honour of captaining his country has been comfortably received by Hussain who has a clear-sighted attitude of what he expects from individuals and the team and, indeed, his county colleagues at Essex benefited from those qualities whenever he was available to lead them last season.

Now charged with piloting his country, Hussain has brought a detectable note of more responsibility to his personal game and is a natural leader who appears relaxed in the fiery arena of Test match cricket.

In the First Test, when England were two for four wickets after 17 minutes of play and 17 deliveries of the game, he was under the greatest pressure.

Although his side were then, as was to be anticipated, swept aside from a position from which, in truth, there was no way back, they regrouped, responding to the captain's pleas to "give me everything" to emerge from the Second Test, gaining a credible draw, although not without one or two alarms in the final session of play.

Captain Hussain though stood on the bridge defiant leaving his opposite number Hanse Cronje to call off his plans to scuttle the England ship with two overs of the game remaining.

Nasser Hussain, who scored 152 runs in the Second Test against South Africa.

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