Morgan not playing England blame game

Cricket: Topley absolved after last-ball loss

Captain Eoin Morgan absolved Reece Topley of any blame for England’s last-ball defeat by South Africa at Newlands, Cape Town, yesterday.

Topley was the unfortunate fall-guy who conceded 15 from the final over of the home run chase as Chris Morris again landed the knockout blow with his brilliant late hitting.

As in Johannesburg a week ago, when the allrounder hit his maiden one-day international 50 to level that series from what seemed an impossible situation, this time he clubbed 14 runs from five balls to consign England to defeat in the first of two Twenty20s in three days.

Morgan’s men must therefore pick themselves up for the final match on this tour, at the Wanderers tomorrow, having seen their winning streak of six in the sprint format ended – despite a fine performance in the field, capped by Chris Jordan’s three for 23, to try to defend 134 for eight.

The captain identified a below-par performance with the bat for England’s troubles, rather thanTopley, whose telling last over was the most expensive of a match dominated by bowlers, and ended with him failing to pull off a run-outwhich would have salvaged a tie.

Morgan said it would be very unfair to criticise Topley.

“The bowling unit as a whole did exceptionally well – there was no bowler who let himself down tonight,” he said. “I think we probably lost the game with the bat. The basics of just adapting to the wicket, we didn’t do well enough. We let ourselves down with a little bit of lack of awareness with the bat.”

Morgan, like his opposite number Faf du Plessis, indicated England’s batsmen failed to assess the situation accurately on a used pitch.

“It’s easy to play with the modeof battingongoodwickets, and expecting that all the time,” he added. “The hardest thing is to get your nut down and score 150-155, which would have been par.”

As for Topley, Morgan is confident he will react favourably to a tough experience.