IND vs SA: David Miller and Co. look to carry on with IPL momentum against India in T20I series
India Today
Several South African players have lit up the Indian Premier League this season. Having already beaten India in the ODI series, can Temba Bavuma’s men repeat that in T20Is?
What a turnaround it has been for South Africa. About eight months back, when South Africa went to the T20 World Cup in the UAE, people did not think they should be taken seriously. And why not? They had dropped one of the best all rounders in the business, Chris Morris, dropped the best batsman in the Indian Premier League, Faf du Plessis, and had not included the most prolific white ball spinner they ever had, Imran Tahir.
Things would still have been fine if it was just the selection calls that the team would have fluffed. One can always argue that the committee wanted to take a different direction and make a statement to back the future generation. However, it did not stop there.
South Africa got into a mess with Quinton de Kock choosing to opt-out of a crucial World Cup game against West Indies over being forced to kneel to show solidarity with the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement.
With an already grim campaign gone grimmer, fans were expecting that South Africa would be obliterated in the ‘group of death’ which had the likes of England, Australia and West Indies. But that did not happen.
After being drubbed by Australia by five wickets in the first match of the Super 12s, South Africa came back strong. A sense of unity under the leadership of Temba Bavuma helped the team exceed expectations. While the team narrowly missed out on the qualification spot to Australia on Net Run Rate, it seemed like somebody had hit the reset button for South Africa cricket.
South Africa as a team have always been placed at the higher echelons in world cricket. The unfortunate tag of chokers comes from the same. They have always had players with exceptional abilities who had not come to pass in the clutch moments of tournaments.
That narrative, though, is a little different now. Coming into the Indian Premier League, none of the South African players came in with the tag of a destroyer. Well, barring the controversy-ridden Quinton de Kock, of course.
