"We were beaten by a champion player today": SA coach

Chennai, March 28 (UNI) ''We were well beaten by a champion player today'', South African cricket coach Michael Arthur said, while praising Virender Sehwag, who scored a brilliant unbeaten triple hundred during the first Test match against South Africa here today.

Talking to newspersons here about the third day's play when the South African bowlers failed to reign in the strong Indian batting line-up, Arthur said ''Sehwag has put India in a very strong position. He pushed the game ahead too, quickly scoring so quickly'', referring to India's easy chase of his team's first innings mammoth score of 540.

Arthur said his team thought that it had the bowlers to dismiss India twice in a Test. ''We still think we have it. But today we played on a flat pitch and stuffy conditions like we did in Pakistan'', he observed.

Arthur said South Africa could still prevent India from taking a big lead tomorrow after taking the second new ball. ''The first 15 overs would be crucial for us'', he added.

He said perhaps Sehwag would be thinking of scoring 400 tomorrow. Perhaps our planning went wrong somewhere, he added.

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