Poor discipline proves costly as Proteas slump again
Spring may have sprung, but the Proteas are yet to bloom.
Australia won the second T20 International at Kingsmead on Friday night by eight wickets, with 31 balls to spare ensuring a gloomy start to the new season for South Africa. The Proteas’s total of 164/8 looked to be at least 40 runs short of a target that would trouble a powerful and aggressive Australian batting line-up.
An erratic effort with the ball, gave the visitors too many gifts, allowing them to coast to a comfortable series win.
Where Wednesday’s performance could be put down to rustiness, Friday’s was plain sloppy by Aiden Markram’s men.
It had started well thanks to Temba Bavuma, who unleashed some electrifying drives to give the home side the initiative in the first half of the Power Play. Amid the gloom of the overall performance the Proteas will hope that Bavuma’s 35 off 17 balls that included six fours and a six, will ignite his season.
The Australians doused the home team’s early fire once Bavuma was dismissed, top edging a pull off Sean Abbott that gave wicketkeeper Josh Inglis an easy catch. A mini collapse followed with Rassie van der Dussen, Reeza Hendricks and Dewald Brevis all dismissed in the space of nine balls for the addition of just two runs.
Australia’s bowling was disciplined; targeting the stumps, but other than seam movement for Nathan Ellis there wasn’t anything especially creative about the tourists’ approach.
Tristan Stubbs (27) and Aiden Markram (49) delivered some respite with a 51-run partnership for the fifth wicket, but then Stubbs attempted an ill-judged reverse flick and was bowled by Jason Behrendorff.
SA’s long tail — with Bjorn Fortuin coming in at no.7 — meant Markram couldn’t attack the second half of the innings in the way he would have liked. He did a reasonable job, but kept running out of partners until he was dismissed, slashing at wide full toss from Abbott and giving an easy catch to Matthew Short on the cover boundary.
Ellis impressed by picking up 3/25. After using the seam movement in his first over, he then cleverly changed pace and bowled cutters that bamboozled South Africa’s lower order batters. Abbott finished with 3/22, with his accuracy a feature.
The Proteas couldn’t match Australia’s discipline. With the exception of LIzaad Williams, the rest of bowling was wretched and Lungi Ngidi in particular looks like he needs a good talking to from the coaching staff. For a bowler of his experience, Friday’s performance was very poor. A wide half volley was followed by a leg stump half volley and in general he struggled with both line and length. As leader of this inexperienced attack, he failed to provide proper guidance and at this stage, he doesn’t look like a bowler deserving of a starting spot at a World Cup.
Australia were typically assertive with Short smashing 66 off 30 balls that included seven fours and four sixes. Mitchell Marsh backed up his unbeaten 92 from Wednesday’s match with another muscular performance scoring 76 not out off 39 balls with seven fours and six sixes. The pair shared a partnership of exactly 100 for the second wicket.
Australia will chase a clean sweep in the series in Sunday’s final match, while for the Proteas some tough talking is needed because their discipline and execution was awful.
