South Africa captain Aiden Markram was all praise for David Miller and Dewald Brevis and their bowlers in their stunning victory over India in the T20 World Cup Super Eights on Monday. South Africa were off to a disastrous start in the powerplay batting first in the match but that ended up being a distant memory as they ended up condemning India, heavy favourites to win the tournament, to a 76-run defeat.
South Africa lost three wickets in the first four overs. However, Dewald Brevis and David Miller then turned it around for them with a 97-run stand for the fourth wicket that came in just 51 balls. “Great performance. I think first and foremost was the partnership,” said Markram after the match. “The guys were great, put that together for us, steadied the ship and kept us in the game.”
Markram praised the pair and Tristan Stubbs later for the way they finished the innings. While Brevis and Miller scored 45 (29 balls) and 63 (35) respectively, Stubbs was unbeaten on 44 off 24 balls. “Conversations towards the back end were that the ball was travelling tonight, felt almost a bit spongy, so it was about finding space where we could run hard, drop the ego and take as much as we could at the back end. They bowled well up front and at the death as well, but I thought our batting through the middle was probably the difference,” he said.
‘Lungi is always a threat’
South Africa were among the teams that made it to the Super Eights without losing a match in the group stage, although they had a close call against Afghanistan. It was a match that they won only after two Super Overs. On Sunday, the recovery act by Miller, Brevis and Stubbs was followed by a clinical bowling effort. Marco Jansen took four wickets while Keshav Maharaj took three and Corbin Bosch took two scalps. Markram himself bowled just one over, which was the first of the Indian innings and he got the prized wicket of Ishan Kishan in it. Lungi Ngidi went wicketless but he gave just 15 runs, thus setting things up for his teammates.
“We’re going to make mistakes, we don’t mind that as a group, so we’ll brush those aside. We feel like Lungi is a threat whenever he bowls and that he can take wickets for us in that middle phase. It depends on conditions,” Markram added.