It was the battle of the bowlers, as yet another contest between the Proteas and India produced an entertaining cliffhanger.
For the second time in two games, Aiden Markram chose to bowl first. But this time around, Marco Jansen and Gerald Coetzee made early breakthroughs to remove both dangerous openers. Sanju Samson may have scored a sparkling century last game, but he went back for nil today.
Andile Simelane’s first T20I wicket was the Indian captain. Soon after, Tilak Varma and Axar Patel tried to rebuild, but the Proteas skipper brought himself on and struck in his first and only over.
Just when he was in the groove, Patel was run out in unfortunate fashion off leggie Nqaba Peter. And the relative lack of batting depth kept the usually aggressive Hardik Pandya in his shell.
It wasn’t until the very end of the innings when he managed to cut loose and break free, and his unbeaten 39 would pump the visitors to just a little better than a run a ball.
While it was a largely disciplined effort with the ball from the hosts, it was time to get cracking with the bat. Ryan Rickelton and Reeza Hendricks injected the early positivity, but when Rickelton holed out, the early momentum gradually began to wane.
Varun Chakaravarthy would soon end up the destroyer-in-chief and bring India back into the game and much more. Markram was bowled off a brilliant googly, and Hendricks would depart in his very next over in similar fashion.
SA tried something outside the box with Marco Jansen coming in at #5, but that roll of the dice wouldn’t bear any fruit. Another googly from Chakaravarthy got another Proteas batter clean bowled.
But that was far from the climactic turn – pun intended – in this tricky chase. As soon as Varun notched up his first ever 5-wicket haul in this format with the wickets of the dangerous Heinrich Klaasen and David Miller, it seemed very likely SA were down and out.
Andile Simelane looked to give a subdued Tristan Stubbs some handy support, but his quest for quick runs was his undoing as well.
But still, the game was far from over. Following Bishnoi’s final over, Suryakumar Yadav turned to pace. Gerald Coetzee arrived and smoked Arshdeep Singh over long-off, and Stubbs got into the act as well.
Consecutive boundaries for the strapping Coetzee against Avesh Khan swung the game back towards SA. 23 from the previous 2 overs erased any semblance of run-rate pressure.
Stubbs cracked four boundaries in the penultimate over to seal the deal. One can say they made hard work of this chase, but India bowled out of their skin to nearly snatch the game away. And it’s yet another indicator of Stubbs’ strong potential and multifaceted approach in T20 cricket.
The series is now all tied up at 1-1, and two more crucial games await us.
IND 124/6 (Pandya 39* – Markram 1-0-4-1, Peter 4-0-20-1)
SA 128/7 in 19 overs (Stubbs 47* – Chakaravarthy 4-0-17-5)
