How South Africa Won The Match

Posted by Laxman on 11:33 PM in | 0 comments

Perfectly timed assault: At the end of 36 overs, South Africa needed 114 runs off 78 deliveries, and the pressure seemed to be telling on them, as evidenced by some increasingly desperate nudging, calling and running between AB de Villiers and JP Duminy. South Africa hasn't really been known for planning its power plays well, but this time they got it bang on, taking it in the 37th, freeing up the two good batsmen in the middle to take a good bite out of the target. And did they ever - de Villiers in particular tore into both Harbhajan and the hitherto unplayable Zaheer (before the PPs, he had analysis of 7-0-17-1), and by the time the assault was done, the ask had been reduced to 72 off 54. Still tough - and it got tougher when de Villiers went immediately after the power plays ended - but that assault, timed to perfection, accomplished more than reduce the target. The assault stopped Zaheer in his tracks just when he looked capable of tying the opposition down on his own; and equally, the big blows launched at Harbhajan likely had an effect on the Indian captain's mind that proved catastrophic later. When he needed someone to bowl the final over, with South Africa needing 13 off 6, it was not to his experienced spinner that he turned, but to Ashish Nehra, playing only his second game of the World Cup. Nehra's first ball went for four, the second for six, and India had been pipped at the post by a team known for its ability to choke.

Line, length and direction: India's chances defending a total far less than they would have expected at the halfway stage of their own innings hinged on one factor: how their seam bowlers would perform. On a wicket almost guaranteed to take turn (remember we are entering peak summer weather, and wickets are guaranteed to be baked hard, hence begin dusting), India had done the counter-intuitive thing and gone in with three seam, against a team weaned on quick bowling. And the way the Indian openers had handled the South African quicks at the start was an ominous sign. If the seamers could get a grip on the SA innings early, the target would begin to weigh on the South Africans, who had famously choked in their previous outing on what seemed a simple chase. And that is precisely what happened. Between them, Zaheer, Ashish Nehra and Munaf Patel bowled 17 of the first 20 overs, at the end of which the Proteas had managed just 89/1 (that the predictable wicket of Graeme Smith to Zaheer Khan). In a display of disciplined bowling, the seam bowlers conceded just one extra (and that was a leg bye). They did stray occasionally, giving away eight boundaries - but against the 41 singles the Proteas took against the slow moving Indian fielders (there is no sight more incongruous than that of Munaf Patel at mid off), there were 70 dot balls delivered. A tactic Dhoni prefers is to pack one side of the field and get his bowlers to bowl on that side of the wicket. The problem has been that more times than not, his bowlers let him down, and bowl far too often on the less tenanted side of the wicket. Not this time - the discipline was exemplary, and the three seam bowlers kept the length exactly where it needed to be: just short of good length to inhibit the drives, and just around off to keep them from going back and playing square. It lifted the ask from 5.97 - a tick less than a run a ball - to 6.98 in this 20-over spell, and ensured that whatever momentum SA had gained in the last few overs of the Indian innings was neutralized






On his Facebook stream, Bangalore resident Sridhar Parthasarathy recounted a classic joke: 'Q: How do you make a million in Las Vegas? A: Go there with a billion!' The prompt for that joke was India, eyeing 350-plus-plenty at one stage, losing 9 wickets for a total of 30 runs starting with the wicket of Sachin Tendukar in the 40th over, one over after the now dreaded batting power play was taken. That's where the first half of the game turned - on that sudden, unexpected implosion as the batting side looked to shift gears. But the real turning point was the introduction, in the 38th over, of Dale Steyn. At that point he had bowled 6-0-41-0 and looked unusually ineffective. His first over of the final spell was, at best, okay - unlike earlier spells, he got his line and length going, but that was the best you could say for it. His second over, the 41st, was a harbinger of what was to follow - laser sharp, searingly fast, and impossibly accurate. It produced two runs and two wickets, and his figures looked much better at 8-0-48-2. He was brought back for the 47th, and his next ten deliveries produced one run and three wickets. It was as incisive a spell of fast death bowling as you could hope to see, and it torpedoed India's hopes of a huge score..
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Laxman Singh

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