South Africa back in the hunt in the Champions Trophy 2009
Posted on 24. Sep, 2009 by admin in Sports
South Africa back to winning ways. AB de Villiers kept the Proteas back in the hunt in the ongoing Champions Trophy 2009.
After the heavy defeat with Sri Lanka in first match, people started ripping off the favorites tag from the Proteas, but they are some serious contenders.
AB de Villiers made 70 and steered his to a 5-wicket victory against the New Zealand in the Group B match at the ongoing ICC Champions Trophy on Thursday.
New Zealand after losing the toss were asked to bat first, but they failed to build a decent score after McCullum gave decent start and Ross Taylor came back to form scoring 72 runs. A 214 runs is what they could pile after being all out. In fact, they lost their last 5 wickets for just 11 runs.
In reply, South Africa kept losing wickets regularly, but it was De Villiers who kept the momentum going and scored run whenever there was an average chance of scoring one. He made 70 from 76 deliveries and that included 9 fours.
The bowling of South Africa looked good and improved, especially left-arm spinner Roelof van der Merwe who contained runs as well as took wickets. Veteran Kallis looked superb and among the black caps McCullum was like mercury; awesome quick behind the wickets, but didn’t quite get support from his bowlers.
