Published: Nov 23, 2014, 12:45 PM (IST)
Edited: Nov 23, 2014, 03:57 PM (IST)
Nov 23, 2014
South Africa set a target of 281 for Australia to win the fifth One-Day International (ODI) at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) on Sunday. Taking the cue from Quinton de Kock‘s impressive sixth ODI ton and a brilliant maiden half-century from Rilee Rossouw, South Africa put up a commanding performance with the bat to reach the total which is pretty impressive on the fast track of SCG.
The day started on a surprising note when during the toss, it was Hashim Amla who came out to lead the South African team instead of regular skipper, AB de Villiers. Winning the toss and electing to bat first, South Africa made a couple of changes to the squad from their previous game loss at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG). Rilee Rossouw was in for de Villiers while Morne Morkel made his way in for speed gun, Dale Steyn. Australia skipper, George Bailey however made just a change in the form of Josh Hazlewood coming in for Nathan Coulter-Nile who pulled his hamstring in the last game.
South African openers, Amla and De Kock were initially shaky for the first few few overs, but settled down immediately scoring 51 runs in the mandatory powerplay phase of the first 10 overs without losing any wicket. However, at the score of 54, it was Amla to depart first after falling to Glenn Maxwell being caught behind by wicketkeeper, Mathew Wade.
Following his dismissal, it was Rossouw who joined de Kock and put up a commanding 107 run partnership. Russouw also scored his maiden half-century before falling for 51 off Pat Cummins at the score of 161. Faf du Plessis next departed soon for mere two and David Miller was also dismissed after scoring five runs. They were dismissed by Cummins and Smith respectively. However, in the meantime, de Kock didn’t panic as he brought up his sixth ODI century off 117 balls. Incidently, he also became the first South African batsman to score a century in the ODIs at the SCG. South Africa was also quick enough to take the batting powerplay between overs 30 and 35 where they scored 22 runs and lost the two wickets of du Plessis and Miller.
Following the century and the powerplay, de Kock couldn’t last long and was dismissed for 107 at the score of 206 by Cummins. His score read 107 off 123 balls with a strike-rate of 86.99 including 14 boundaries. Following his dismissal, South Africa had lost half of their batting team and Farhaan Behardien along with Wayne Parnell took control for the next total phase of the innings as Behardien brought up his second half-century of his career. Both the batsmen went for the big shots and finally ended up putting a commanding total of 281 on the board, Behardien being dismissed on the third-last ball.
Brief scores:
South Africa 280 for 6 in 50 overs (Quinton de Kock 107, Rilee Rossouw 51, Farhaan Behardien 63; Pat Cummins 3 for 54) vs Australia
