Bangladesh scored their highest ever One-Day International total after being put into bat to set them on the way to a 21-run victory over the Proteas in match 5 of the ICC World Cup at The Oval in London on Sunday.
It was Bangladesh’s opening match of the tournament while the Proteas are without a victory after two matches.
The Proteas were set to score what would have been a tournament record chase total of 331 for victory. The current record stands behind the name of Ireland who beat England by chasing down a total of 329 in the 2011 edition.
There were many reasons behind the Proteas defeat, the most important probably being a poor bowling performance in the first half of the innings that saw them concede a huge number of boundaries while they were unable to make significant breakthroughs.
The Proteas situation was not helped by the hamstring injury suffered by Lungi Ngidi who retired from the fray after bowling only four overs.
This impacted seriously on the Proteas bowling plans as it meant Imran Tahir, playing his 100th ODI, had to bowl most of his overs later in the innings than normal and Ngidi’s absence left a big hole in the death bowling resources in the critical final 10 overs.
It makes getting Dale Steyn fit for the third match against India at Southampton on Wednesday a matter of urgency.
The Proteas batsmen had to work far harder for their runs than their opponents and they needed at least one of their top order to go bigger than Faf du Plessis’ top score of 62 (53 balls, 5 fours and a six) for them to get close.
They went into the final 10 overs needing 103 runs and continued to lose wickets against disciplined bowling.
– African News Agency (ANA)
