India falter in run chase against South Africa

Morne Morkel picked up four wickets, including the scalps of Dhoni and Kohli

Morne Morkel’s 4-wicket haul helped South Africa defeat India by 18 runs in the 3^rd ODI at Rajkot on Sunday thus giving the visitors a 2-1 lead in the 5-match series. A late fightback by the Indian bowlers nullified the foundation laid by Quinton de Kock’s century, but chasing the target of 271 set by the Proteas, India fell short despite fighting half-centuries by Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli.

Despite the defeat at Indore, South Africa went in unchanged while MS Dhoni bolstered the spin department by bringing in Amit Mishra for Umesh Yadav. With the pitch offering a high-scoring affair, South African skipper AB de Villiers who won the toss had no hesitation in batting first.

The Proteas made an interesting move upfront sending in out-of-form David Miller to open the innings along with Quinton de Kock. They were able to counter the around-the-wicket strategy adopted by Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Mohit Sharma effectively and scored 59 runs in the mandatory powerplay overs.

Harbhajan Singh, who was bowling economically, made the pressure count by giving India the breakthrough dismissing Miller with a flighted delivery that the left-hander ended up slicing to Rahane at backward point. Mishra and Harbhajan were bowling in tandem superbly and the pressure paid off as Amla was outfoxed by the leg-spinner and Dhoni flicked the bails off in a flash to have him stumped.

That brought the in-form Du Plessis to the crease and he continued his impressive run off late though he had a huge slice of luck early on. He was caught at long-on but got a reprieve after Mohit Sharma had slightly overstepped and in the very next over, an outstretched Suresh Raina failed to hold on to a top edge off Axar Patel’s bowling.

De Kock was batting comfortably at the other end and along with Du Plessis helped South Africa cross the 200-run mark in the 38^th over. De Kock brought up his 7th ODI hundred and the fourth against India while Du Plessis scored his third half-century on the trot and South Africa looked like heading to a big total.

However, three wickets in the space of just 9 balls derailed their innings with both the settled batsmen as well as the dangerman AB de Villiers perished in quick intervals to reduce the visitors to 213/5. They never recovered as Duminy and Behardien failed to reproduce their T20 heroics, with the latter especially struggling to hit the big shots. In fact, Behardien’s first boundary in his 36-ball knock came off the last ball of the innings as South Africa ended their innings at 270/7.

The Indian openers started off tentatively in reply with Shikhar Dhawan especially struggling to rotate the strike and soon found his way back to the pavilion after a 29-ball 13. Rohit Sharma, however, continued his rich vein of form and along with Virat Kohli who started off positively after coming in at 3, added 72 runs for the second wicket in quick time that brought India back into the equation.

Duminy, however, showed his usefulness as a bowler breaking up the partnership picking up Sharma’s wicket for 65. The 3^rd wicket partnership of Dhoni and Kohli yielded 80 runs but it came at a price as economical bowling by the South African bowlers pushed the run rate beyond the 7-run mark.

The pressure started to tell and though Kohli managed to score his first half-century in 13 matches, Dhoni fell short off his own by 3 runs as the returning Morne Morkel picked up the Indian skipper. The lanky fast bowler provided further breakthroughs dismissing the well set Kohli and Rahane caught at mid-wicket in almost identical fashion to all but ensure victory for his side.

Raina failed to trouble the scorers and the spin duo of Axar Patel and Harbhajan couldn’t produce the big shots that were needed and in the end India fell short by 18 runs.