South Africa knocked out of ICC Champions Trophy
South Africa faced England in their last match of the group stage of the ICC Champions Trophy. The Proteas had a chance of making it in the semi-final for the tournament, but lost by 22 runs at Supersport Park, Centurion in Gauteng. England batted first, racking up a total of 332 for the loss of 8 wickets. Collingwood was the 2nd highest scoring batsmen for England, knocking 82 runs off 94 balls before being dismissed by Wayne Parnell. Shah was the best batsmen for England hitting 98 runs off 89 balls. Johan Botha dismissed Shah, he was caught behind by Mark Boucher. On the bowling side, Wayne Parnell managed to get 3 wickets for South Africa. Johan Botha picked up 2 wickets.
South Africa came in to bat, chasing the biggest total ever at Supersport Park, but once again choked under pressure from a very well disciplined English team. At least South African captain Graeme Smith finally found some form, scoring 141 runs off 134 balls. AB De Villiers was the 2nd highest scoring South African batsmen, only managing 36 runs off 41 balls. Minor contributions by Gibbs (22), Kallis (12), JP Duminy (24), Mark Boucher (8) and Morkel (17) wasn’t really instrumental into helping South Africa reach the target quicker. Broad and Anderson each took 3 wickets for England. Shah was named as the man of the match. Some people might say that the Proteas are continuing the old trend of “choking” in big matches. One could also argument that South African Cricket is in a transformation stage. New, unexperienced players are coming in it will be a while before the Proteas are on top form again. I don’t go pub crawling to watch them play any more, since I can’t handle the disappointment of South Africa losing yet another big game. Well done to the Proteas for trying harder than usual. In my opinion, this was just a case of South Africa being outplayed by England, pure and simple.
