IND vs RSA: India Crawl Their Way To 124/6 After Top Order Collapse

IND vs RSA: After a dominant win in the first T20, India batters failed to fire in the second T20I game against South Africa on Sunday. South African bowlers triggered top-order collapse at St George’s Park in Gqeberha. With Hardik Pandya’s all time third slowest innings, India crawled their way to 124/6 in 20 overs.

South African skipper Aiden Markram won the toss and decided to bowl first in the second T20I against India, which he proved right as South Africa capitalised early with Marco Jansen commencing the innings with a wicket-maiden. Within the powerplay, the Proteas easily reduced India to 3 wickets down wherein they dismissed a crucial wicket of India’s captain Suryakumar Yadav. By the 12th over, India had lost half its side while battling at 75 runs.

Hardik Pandya’s Lone Fight For India

The only positive India had while batting was in Hardik Pandya. The all-rounder fought hard with a steady knock of 39 runs from 45 balls. However, he wasn’t sufficient enough to establish India towards a competitive total because of his slow-paced innings. After all such efforts from Pandya, India could not score more than 124 runs on their side in 20 overs, which is hard to defend.

It started with slight drizzles during the toss but remained clear since then. India had dominated South Africa by some margin in the first T20I, partly owing to blistering form from Sanju Samson. It was being played at St George’s Park in Gqeberha—an arena South Africa traditionally enjoyed a strong record at. This was the fifth T20I in this stadium, where South Africa had thrashed New Zealand by 33 runs in 2012, Australia by 12 runs in 2020, and India by five wickets in 2023.

Hopes Of India Rest On Arshdeep Singh

Other than Samson’s solidity, another man for India would look forward to take his good form forward for this match. The cricketer is pacer Arshdeep Singh. Singh has been very helpful in his team’s wins by taking the wickets in the initial overs of the powerplay. This left-arm pacer has taken 33 wickets in 21 T20Is so far this year at a great average of 18.12. His best bowling figures have been 4/37. Singh now needs just five wickets to surpass Bhuvneshwar Kumar’s record for the most wickets by an Indian bowler in a calendar year in T20Is.

Teams For The Second T20I

India (Playing XI): Sanju Samson (wk), Abhishek Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav (c), Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya, Rinku Singh, Axar Patel, Arshdeep Singh, Ravi Bishnoi, Varun Chakaravarthy, Avesh Khan.

South Africa (Playing XI): Ryan Rickelton, Reeza Hendricks, Aiden Markram (c), Tristan Stubbs, Heinrich Klaasen (wk), David Miller, Marco Jansen, Andile Simelane, Gerald Coetzee, Keshav Maharaj, Nqabayomzi Peter.

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