Faf du Plessis creates a captaincy record against Australia

South Africa skipper, Faf du Plessis becomes the first ever International captain to beat Australia at home in all three formats of the game.

South Africa defeated Australia by 21 runs in the one-off T20I at the Carrara Oval in Queensland on Saturday (November 17).

With this win, skipper Du Plessis became the first ever International captain to defeat the mighty Aussies who are known to be ruthless at home.

Earlier, the Proteas defeated Aaron Finch-led side 2-1 in the ODI series after winning the third and final ODI at Bellerive Oval, Hobart by 40 runs.

This was South Africa's second bilateral ODI series win against Australia in their own backyard.

The South Africans won their first ever bilateral ODI series against the Aussies (in Australia) back in January 2009 under former skipper, Johan Botha when they thrashed the Ricky Ponting-led side 4-1 to clinch the five-match ODI series in an emphatic fashion.

ODI series win, 2018

In the same tour, South Africa won their first ever Test series on Australian soil by defeating them 2-1 in the three-match Test series under the former captain, Graeme Smith.

They followed it up with 1-0 Test series win during the 2012-13 tour. During the 2014-15 tour, Australia gave a strong replay by winning the five-match ODI series by the same margin.

In 2018, with the victories in ODI (2-1) and T20I series (one-off game), Du Plessis became the first ever International captain to defeat Australia in all three formats of the game, having won the Test series 2-1 back in November 2016.

With the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup just six months away, this does not augur well for the defending champions having lost one more ODI series under Aaron Finch.

The absence of David Warner, Steven Smith has certainly affected the Aussies and the morale of the team has gone down since their ban.

On the contrary, the Proteas have proved as to why they are one of the teams to watch out for the quadrennial event next summer by thrashing the World champions in their own backyard. Thrashing Australia at home is no easy task as the stats reveal, but for Du Plessis, it isn't one!