Proteas batsmen crush tigers
Most one-sided match in limited overs history
HASHIM Amla and Quinton de Kock won the most one-sided match in limited overs history for South Africa in Kimberley yesterday. In the process, they crushed any hope Bangladesh had of celebrating Mushfiqur Rahim’s historic hundred with a win.
Mushfiqur’s unbeaten 110 was the first century scored by a Bangladeshi in any of the 34 matches they have played against South Africa, regardless of the format, and their total of 278/7 was their highest in an ODI against South Africa.
But risibly harmless bowling saw South Africa chase down the target with 7.1 overs remaining and all 10 wickets standing.
The 282 runs De Kock and Amla shared represents a world-record thrashing, surpassing the 256 runs Jason Roy and Alex Hales shared in England’s 10-wicket win over Sri Lanka at Edgbaston in June last year.
“When you’re bossing the game it’s easy to throw your wicket away when you’re 150 without loss, but the guys were hungry,” appreciative captain Faf du Plessis said.
De Kock’s undefeated 168, which he scored off 145 balls with 21 fours and two sixes, was his 14th ton in ODIs.
Amla extended his record as South Africa’s champion centurion in the format to 26 with his 110 not out, from 112 deliveries, which included eight fours.
The partnership was the joint-third highest for the first wicket in all ODI cricket, and South Africa’s highest for any wicket against any opponents.
It made De Kock and Amla the country’s most successful pair of batsmen.
No other South African pair have scored as many runs together in ODIs as the 3 664 owned by De Kock and Amla.
Bangladesh’s problem was not that their bowlers – all seven of them – performed especially poorly or that their fielders squandered opportunities.
Instead, the issue was that their utterly harmless attack would have struggled to dismiss schoolchildren on a pitch that offered neither movement off the seam nor turn, and with cosy straight boundaries and a fast outfield only adding to the challenge.
So, despite their batting success, Bangladesh were always likely to struggle to keep South Africa’s batting lineup in check at a ground where the lowest total yet defended in an ODI is New Zealand’s 279/8 in January 2013, when the South Africans lost half their wickets to runouts and were dismissed for 252.
The first chance offered came in the 38th over, when Amla, on 94, blipped a return catch at Taskin Ahmed – who could not untangle himself from his follow-through smartly enough to hold on.
Five balls before Bangladesh were put out of their misery, De Kock was dropped by Nasir Hossain at long-on off Mashrafe Mortaza.
Not that the Bangladeshis looked too upset. Perhaps they are getting used to taking a shellacking: in their last 83 overs in the field in ODIs, they have claimed only one wicket.
The rest of South Africa’s batsmen could only sit with their noses pressed to the dressingroom window and dream of getting a knock in Paarl on Wednesday.
Mushfiqur took guard in the 15th over and raised his bat to celebrate his fifth ODI hundred in the 45th, to the raucous delight of Bangladeshi supporters.
He took 108 balls to get to three figures, and in all faced 116 deliveries and hit 11 fours and two sixes.
Although helped by the conditions and indifferent bowling – Kagiso Rabada and Imran Tahir excepted – Mushfiqur earned his applause with a plucky, error-free innings.
Rabada delivered a fine opening spell of six overs in which he took 1/11 on his way to 4/43, and Tahir claimed 1/45.