New Delhi: India won the deciding T20I in Cape Town on Saturday to take the series 2-1 and sign off on a high and stand-in skipper Rohit Sharma credited the bowlers for all the success after he felt that the Indian total was 15 short of what the team management would have liked at the Newlands Stadium.
“To be honest, I thought we were 15 runs short. How the first half went, I thought we lost our way towards the end. I mean these things happen and we learn from it. It was a decent score and once again, the bowlers did it for us. We know how crucial it is for our top three to stay as long as possible. It has happened throughout the series. Last match, it was pleasing to see our middle order perform. Hopefully we can move forward as a group in the coming games. We discussed certain plans and it worked. We tried to keep the ball on the stumps. Their batsmen like width. So it made them go after the bowling after 6 overs.
“It was a complete bowling unit performance. Throughout the series, we showed a lot of intensity, which helped us get those crucial wins. We never backed down from whatever situation we were thrown in,” Rohit said at the end of the game.
Suresh Raina and Shikhar Dhawan starred with the bat but it was Bhuvneshwar Kumar who again held his nerve in the end as India sealed the T20I series with a sensational 2-1 win over South Africa in Cape Town.
India suffered an early blow after in-form Virat Kohli was ruled out due to a stiff back. Stand in skipper Rohit Sharma again departed early, but then Suresh Raina and Shikhar Dhawan made most of some ordinary South African bowling. Raina counter-attacked but Dhawan played the anchor role with perfection. In fact, Dhawan got his first boundary off the 29th ball but scored an 47 off 40. He was given two chances, with Shamsi dropping a couple of sitters.
Southpaw Raina scored a quickfire 43 off just 27 balls, Pandya(21) and Karthik (13) chipped in with the runs towards the end as India finished their innings at 172/7. South Africa bowled well in patches with Junior Dala again impressive with his raw pace, as he picked up 3/35 in his 4 overs.
Morris came back strongly after an ordinary start to finish with figures of 2/43. South Africa never really got into the chase as they got off to a horrendous start, losing in-form Reeza Hendricks early. Miller – who opened the innings for the first time in T20Is – looked lackluster, failing to find boundaries as the home team struggled to get any momentum.
Hero of the previous match Klaasen couldn’t contribute much either as he departed for 7. Duminy waged a lone battle for South Africa, scoring 55 off just 41 balls, including hitting Axar Patel for 16 off 1 over.
India used the slower balls to perfection and Suresh Raina chipped in with 3 overs, giving away only 27 runs and picking the wicket of David Miller. Just when it seemed India would coast home to victory, debutant Christiaan Jonker played a blinder which almost took his team in sight of victory.
South Africa managed to get 45 runs from the three overs preceding the final one, meaning they required 19 off the final over. Despite giving away a boundary, Bhuvneshwar Kumar held his nerve as India went onto win by 7 runs, with Jonker’s 24-ball 49 going in vain.