THE Oxigen Proteas made an emphatic statement ahead of the ICC World Twenty20 when they thrashed England by 9 wickets with all of 32 balls to spare in the second KFC T20 International match at the Bidvest Wanderers Stadium on Sunday.
It gave the Proteas a 2-0 series win with AB de Villiers being named KFC Man of the Match and Imran Tahir the KFC Man of the Series.
England are the Proteas’ first opponents at the ICC event in India and this performance will give them extra confidence. Significantly, the Proteas won both matches batting second which is an area where they have run into problems in previous ICC events.
De Villiers (71 off 29 balls, 6 fours and 6 sixes) and Hashim Amla (69 not out off 38 balls, 8 fours and 3 sixes) set up the successful runs chase with their partnership of 125 in just 8.2 overs. It revived memories of South Africa’s record first wicket partnership of 170 between Graeme Smith and Loots Bosman, also against England, at SuperSport Park in 2009. It must have revived unwanted memories of that match for the two England survivors, Eoin Morgan and Adil Rashid.
De Villiers and Amla complement one another perfectly with their diverse styles. While De Villiers stood out for the ruthlessness of his brutality, Amla was a joy for the purists, stroking 3 fours off one over from Ben Stokes and 4 off another from Chris Jordan.
De Villiers improved his SA record for the fastest 50 from 23 balls to 21 while Amla was no slouch either with 50 off 27 balls. Their power play of 88 runs in six overs was the third highest ever achieved but the highest in a match involving two full members of the ICC.
Once they had finished with only 47 needed off the remaining 70 balls there was little left for Amla and Faf du Plessis to provide the finishing touches.
For the first time on this tour England opted to play an extra batsman and break up their successful formula of playing four front-line seamers. And their bowlers chose this match to be off colour with Reece Topley being way below his best, possibly a hangover from that last ball finish at PPC Newlands.
The extra batsman did not help England’s cause as they achieved what many would have thought impossible of being only three wickets down midway through the 17th over and then failing to bat out the full 20. A horrific collapse saw them lose 7 wickets for 14 runs and turn what looked like being a total in the region of 200 or more into a below-par 171.
This followed major stands of 50 for the second wicket between Joe Root and the consistent Alex Hales, who was one of two batsmen to be run out, and then 96 for the fourth between Morgan and Jos Buttler.
England were unlucky to lose Morgan to a run out at the non-striker’s wicket on a deflection from Kyle Abbott but this should not detract from another outstanding fielding effort from the Proteas and some excellent death bowling which saw the seamers hit the blockhole regularly.
Morgan top-scored for England, showing some belated form, with 54 off 28 balls with 4 fours and 4 sixes.
Abbott was the most successful bowler with 3/26.
If the Proteas could be faulted for anything it was the 56 runs conceded by the fifth bowler combination of David Wiese and JP Duminy but that cannot detract from a five-star team performance. Duminy was one of several to take a brilliant catch.
