Anrich Nortje relishes bowling at speeds rarely seen in English conditions

South African speedster Anrich Nortje said he relished bowling at speeds rarely seen in English conditions, after he was timed at 148 kph in his team's crushing innings defeat of England in their first Test at Lord's on Friday.

Nortje ripped through the heart of the home batting, taking three wickets in 10 balls at one point, as England slumped to 149 all out in their second innings to lose the Test inside three days.

Nortje's average speed in the over where he dismissed the dangerous Jonny Bairstow was 148 kph, making it the quickest over England have had to face at home in the last decade of test cricket, according to the analytics website CricViz.

"It's exciting, something I've wanted to do since I was a kid," Nortje told a news conference.

"It's hard work, you have to get yourself up. Sometimes you think you've bowled the right ball and it just goes to the boundary and then you have your captain saying 'It's a good ball, keep going, keep going'. That helped me at stages as well. But yeah, it's a nice feeling."

Nortje, 28, admitted he does sneak a look at the board display for the speed gun, measuring the pace of bowlers' deliveries, to see what pace he is generating.

"I do, I do, but it's not a focus to be trying to go quicker or slow or whatever. But it is nice to see when the rhythm is there.

"Sometimes it feels like it's a lot slower and the speed gun says something different, and then sometimes it feels fast, then this speed guns says it's slow. But when I'm on the field, I just try and execute as much as possible."

Nortje's speed was one of the talking points of the test victory, but the overall proficiency of the South African seam attack has also been lavishly praised.

Kagiso Rabada was named man of the match for his seven-wicket haul, with Lungi Ngidi taking the vital wicket of Joe Root and the 22-year-old Marco Jansen chipping in with two more near the end of the match.