South Africa trump England by three wickets in nail-biter

The Proteas cannot lose the series whereas the English team can just hope to level it. Visitors will come out hard at the South Africans after the former’s loss in the one day worldwide (ODI) series and the first T20I.

Chris Morris proved the hero for the Proteas, thumping a four and a six to leave the hosts needing just two off the last ball for victory.

Willey’s contribution with the bat was quickly erased as the hosts amassed eight runs from his first two balls, four leg byes followed by Hashim Amla clipping the left-armer off his pads and to the fence.

The final run would have been agony for England as bowler Reece Topley bowler fumbled a relatively simple return from Joe Root on the long-on boundary and should have run Kyle Abbot out at the non-striker’s end going for the winning run.

“We let ourselves down with a little bit of lack of awareness with the bat”.

“I see him as having a huge amount of potential and I’ll be saying to him if we played a game like this tomorrow night, I’d have no worries giving him the ball again”. He scored 27 valuable runs for his side. Chris Jordan put in his best bowling performance of the tour and Ben Stokes was also accurate and consistent as the bowlers kept England in the game after the batsmen failed to fire.

South Africa leg-spinner Imran Tahir was named man of the match after equalling his career best with figures of four for 21. But England bowled well on a slow pitch as no batsman was able to dominate.

South Africa¿s Faf du Plessis looks up as he plays a shot during the T20 cricket match between South Africa and England in Cape Town, South Africa, Friday, Feb. 19, 2016.

“It’s easy to play with the mode of batting on good wickets, and expecting that all the time”, he added. The wicket was two-paced and not a normal T20 wicket but I have a smile on my face because we won. He missed on his hat-trick after his googly narrowly missed the stumps after beating Chris Jordan’s defense. The in-form Alex Hales top edges a sweep and Duminy nearly collides nastily with Rabada while taking a fine catch. Fielders have suffered awful injuries in the past in such situations but both got back to their feet.

Buttler ensured he stayed around to take England to a defendable score and the wicketkeeper struck an unbeaten 32 from 30 balls to help his side to 134-8. Duminy fell while trying to get underneath a fullish delivery off Adil Rashid, and du Plessis smashed a Moeen Ali delivery straight down the throat of Stokes at long-on.

And the man who earned a million-dollar contract with Delhi in the recent Indian Premier League auction did it again at Newlands, scoring 17 from seven balls to hand England their first T20 defeat in 18 months.

Topley did have an opportunity to redeem himself even after seeing the second and third balls of his final over hit for a four and a six by Morris.