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Cape Town – For about four fifths of their World Cup clash with India, South Africa clung on, as if a gutsy second-tier nation, at the Rose Bowl.
Finally it unravelled in the last fifth, Virat Kohli’s side more glaringly making them seem minnows as a volley of imperious strokes put the game to bed by six wickets … aided by a mounting plague of tragicomic Proteas moments in the fielding department which, some gurus insist, tells you so much about a team’s state of harmony and mental wellbeing.
By then, South Africa did look all too uncomfortably like the near basement-dwellers they are (only ahead of Afghanistan, but having played an extra match). That is the scary thing about the three-match, winless exposure to the tournament the Proteas have had so far – indisputably their most nightmarish start in any World Cup.
They have now been swept aside by both England and India, plus beaten in a tighter tussle by Bangladesh.
It doesn’t take a maths professor to tell you that a gloriously unlikely six wins out of six may be the requirement from here to make the semi-finals; possibly someone on the fringes will get away with five, which provides a slightly more plausible semblance of hope for the Proteas.
But just how confidently would anyone, here and now, expect them to prevail in all or even five of these remaining half-dozen fixtures: West Indies, Afghanistan (that one, famous last words, still looks a banker!), New Zealand, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Australia?
They just seem so abjectly, surprisingly “nowhere” as title challengers in these grim early days.
It is going to be a battle just to stave of being statistically the worst-faring South African CWC team: they need five victories to ensure they earn a win percentage record above 50 percent, which is the nadir the SA side of 2003 registered on home turf – and that was branded a relative shocker of a tournament for them – with three triumphs (Kenya, Bangladesh, Canada) negated by two reverses (West Indies, New Zealand) and then a fateful tie with Sri Lanka in the infamous Duckworth/Lewis booboo game at Kingsmead.
There were at least some fairly protracted signs of fight, of tight-jawed desperation, in Wednesday’s latest setback by Du Plessis and company.
But quality, either as individuals or as a combination? That stayed decisively elusive, and explained why the life was ever so slowly, yet calculatedly and coolly sucked out of them by India.
In broad cricketing terms, the Proteas have long – and fittingly – been branded one of the “big four” powers on the global stage, so it is galling and sobering to see them lying ninth on the current, admittedly still quite infant World Cup table.
Not in one single department of the game can you submit at present that South Africa, based on their showings in England, contain genuine ooh-aah factor.
While the depleted seam trio of Kagiso Rabada, Chris Morris and Andile Phehlukwayo all put their hands to the pump with welcome relish in defence of a sub-standard SA total on a traditionally high-scoring ground (and had plentiful ill-luck up front), the most penetrative and spiteful quickie on show was still India’s tall, unorthodox-action Jasprit Bumrah.
India also won the spin battle hands down: some prior tormentors of the Proteas, Yuzvendra Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav, comfortably out-bamboozled their own Imran Tahir and Tabraiz Shamsi, although the latter two had their effectiveness blunted to a good degree by not having an extra 50 or 60 runs to play with.
Fielding? Well, there was a time when India didn’t look too committed to soundest techniques and work ethics in that area, but they have all but eliminated that hallmark in modern times … whereas South Africa, so sadly, have regressed markedly in a discipline they once ruled the roost in; it was simply evident again at Hampshire’s headquarters.
The batting head-to-head was marked by Indian opener Rohit Sharma keeping his composure brilliantly from a notably fortuitous start to strike a 144-ball, unbeaten 122: exactly the sort of gumption and patience that was needed from a specialist on a pitch with some disconcerting bounce off a good length and appreciable “sideways” at times.
Once again no Proteas player, certainly among the key top six, was able to cash in on a promising start and, as former captain Graeme Smith noted sagely in television commentary, there have been some 15 instances at CWC 2019 of SA stroke-players getting past 20 but nobody yet going on to a proper “biggie” in any of the three debilitating defeats.
There were, however, shafts of light.
Not long after statistics had gone up on screen demonstrating that South Africa’s lower order (Nos 7-11) were the least productive tail, based on averages, of all competing World Cup nations in ODIs since the last jamboree in Australasia in 2015, Morris, Phehlukwayo and Rabada all showed some pleasing mettle at the Southampton crease.
Still, this was one of those matches where, with the berths of several Proteas stalwarts looking increasingly tenuous (Hashim Amla and JP Duminy arguably top of the pile) it was almost better to be a bib-wearer in the SA squad.
On that basis, all of newly-arrived left-arm seamer Beuran Hendricks, Dwaine Pretorius and Aiden Markram (there won’t be the injured Lungi Ngidi yet) should feel reasonably chipper about the prospect of a gig against West Indies on Monday at the same ground.
But it also says plenty about the spectacularly wide-ranging pickle the Proteas are in.
*Follow our chief writer on Twitter: @RobHouwin
