Opener, Alex Hales and number three, Joe Root, once again grounded the initial authority on the pitch as they scored 65 and 125 respectively, forming a 125-run partnership.
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“Stuart’s played more than 100 one-dayers for England and has huge amounts of experience”, he added.
Earlier, opting to bat first, star batsman Joe Root (125) notched up his highest ODI score till date to help England score 318 for the loss of eight wickets.
It did not prove enough, however, as Quinton de Kock continued his phenomenal record to become the youngest player to reach 10 ODI centuries and the experienced Hashim Amla hit 127 as the Proteas won by seven wickets to reduce the deficit to 2-1.
Root, who looked fluent on the way to his career-best ODI score, only gave one chance, to de Kock, when he was on 44, but otherwise looked at his fluent best.
After losing the first two ODIs, South Africa made a brilliant comeback in the third match and will be looking to level the five-match series when they take on England in the fourth one-day worldwide in Johannesburg on Friday (today).
Rashid also chipped in with a quick-fire 39 off 26 balls while paceman Kagiso Rabada took the last three wickets to finish with four for 45.
On each of those occasions, though, it was white-ball consolation for Test failure; this time, England are on course to beat South Africa in both formats – something no tourists have done here since Australia in 2001/02 – not to mention the two Twenty20s still to come. South Africa’s victory was never in doubt at that stage, however, and Faf du Plessis saw them over the line in confident style.
AB de Villiers had suggested he might attack him with a couple of slips on the highveld, after Buttler finished Saturday’s match at Port Elizabeth in the blink of an eye.
Stuart Broad returns to the England side for the first time since the 2015 World Cup.
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South Africa kept themselves in contention after completing a record chase easily in the third ODI at SuperSport Park on Tuesday. It managed to peg South Africa back with some timely strikes, but with the scoreboard reading 250 for 5 after 33.3 overs and a set de Kock at the crease, a South African win wasn’t yet impossible when the skies opened up in Bloemfontein. I’m from here and so are a couple of guys in the team and we feel it’s definitely a chasing kind of wicket.
