Colombo: India defeated South Africa by one run in the final Super Eight match but crashed out of the ICC T20 World Cup on the virtue of net run-rate. India needed to restrict South Africa for 121 runs or less but couldn't do that.
Earlier in the day, Pakistan registered a convincing victory over Australia by 32 runs and that meant that India needed to beat South Africa by almost the same margin to get ahead of Pakistan in terms of run-rate. India after posting 152 runs needed to stop the Proteas for 121 runs or less, but as it turned out South Africa got close to the total and only lost by one run.
{niftybox width=300px,background=ivory,textcolor=maroon,float=right,textalign=justify,border=gold,font=Arial,fontsize=12px}
Brief Score:
India: 152/6 (Raina 45, Rohit 25, Peterson 2-25)
South Africa: 151/10 (du Plessis 65, Zaheer 3-22)
Match Facts:
Toss: South Africa
India Powerplay: 36 runs, 3 wickets
South Africa Powerplay: 46 runs, 2 wickets
Man of the match: Yuvraj Singh
{/niftybox}
India would have wanted to bat second but that didn’t happen as AB de Villiers elected to bowl first after winning the toss. Indian openers did not look comfortable against the pace of Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel and Gautam Gambhir was the first to succumb to pressure. Virat Kohli than came in to bat with India at 23 for one, a lot was expected from him but he got out trying to nudge a Kallis delivery on the leg-side.
Virender Sehwag after hitting a six of Robin Peterson played a rash shot the very next delivery to get bowled with India at 36/3.
Yuvraj Singh and Rohit Sharma steadied things for the team, with Yuvraj looking particularly dangerous lofting the South African spinners at every given opportunity. He hit two sixes in his innings of 21 before getting bowled by Morne Morkel.
Rohit at the other end consumed a lot of deliveries and that put pressure on Raina who responded beautifully and took the Indian innings ahead. Rohit’s wicket was a blessing in disguise for the Indian team as captain Dhoni came in to bat and started finding the gaps immediately.
He along with Raina put up a handy partnership and took India’s total past 150. Raina finished was run-out on the last delivery at 45 and Dhoni remained unbeaten on 23.
India with the ball got off to a great start as both Hashim Amla and Kallis were back in the pavilion inside the fourth over with the score at 16. Faf du Plessis who was playing his first match of the tournament looked in wonderful touch and punished Indian bowlers for every lose delivery they bowled. Captain AB de Villiers at the other end also accumulated runs pretty efficiently.
Yuvraj Singh got India the break through with his first ball when he got de Villiers out. At that time it was looking that India might stop South Africa from reaching 121 but some surprising bowling changes cost India the advantage. Dhoni opted for Rohit Sharma ahead of R Ashwin and he conceded 13 runs to bring back the momentum in the South African innings. Faf du Plessis played amazingly well and reached his fifty, he took
South Africa close to 100 run mark and got out to Yuvraj on the individual score of 65.
All the South African batsmen that followed played descent little knocks and SA needed 14 of the last over. L Balaji was trusted with the ball by skipper Dhoni and he was hit for a six off the first delivery by Albie Morkel. But on his secnd delivery he got Albie out, the next delivery was a dot and Morne Morkel dispatched the fourth delivery into the stands. South Africa needed two runs of two deliveries with one wicket remaining, Balaji bowled a good delivery and cleaned up Morne to win India the match.
By Indian Sports News Network
