The Indian middle-order never got going in the series.
Advertisement
The rest of the series was much closer though. The bowlers did the rest, and the result was emphatic: South Africa won by 214 runs.
Du Plessis then stitched 164 runs in 103 balls with de Villiers before he retired hurt when the score was 351 for 2. His magical touch seemed to be missing in the series, especially in the last match where he looked completely helpless.
On the other hand, South Africa felt the absence of all-rounder JP Duminy on Thursday, who was ruled out of the series due to a hand injury.
A look at the performance of two teams on various parameters should make interesting reading. He didn’t get a lot of credit but it was perhaps the most important knock of the three. We feel our lower order batting is slightly on the lighter side when we play against good fast bowlers.
India-based website CricHD will stream the fifth and final India vs. South Africa ODI at this link, but fans who choose that option will have to put up with numerous advertisements that often cause slowdowns when viewing online.
The one-day series will be followed by four Test matches. Overall, this is the 17th score of 400 or more in an ODI. India have achieved it five times, while Australia and Sri Lanka have got there twice each.
Proteas registered their first-ever bilateral ODI series in India in the five-match ODI series (3-2) soon after their 2-0 triumph in the three T20s.
Hashim Amla completes fastest 6000 runs in ODI by taking just 123 innings, leaving Kohli (136 innings) behind. And as innings progressed the bowlers looked hapless against the rumbustious South African batting. The world record is 22 by New Zealand in the 21-over match against West Indies at Queenstown in 2014. Sixty-four of his 109 came against India’s lead spinners, each at better than a run-a-ball. The 438 is also the highest total in Asia and against a team from Asia.
From Viv Richards to Sanath Jayasuriya and now, AB de Villiers. “I won’t really count (it as) a bad performance, it was so bad you can’t really count it”, he added. “India need to find a solution to tackle him ahead of the Test series”, he said. Nine of the top 12 such innings are by de Villiers.
“It was a great series”, de Villiers said.
The 31-year-old reached his century, his 23rd in the format, in just 57 balls and cleared the boundary ropes easily. AB de Villiers bettered his own record.
De Villiers has now scored 23 ODI centuries – most by a South African batsman. For the first two ODIs, Kohli played at number four, making way for Ajinkya Rahane. “The game was still under control till the 20th-25th over, but after that they started to accelerate, and started scoring at more than 10 runs every over”. India’s Virender Sehwag has six such hundreds.
His genius was on display once again on Sunday as South Africa hammered out 438-4 in their 50 overs against India. The Indian bowling looked haywire as all bowlers went for plenty.
Advertisement
“Bowling is a major worry for India now”.
