Tristan Stubbs overshadowed Varun Chakaravarthy’s sensational five-fer through a gutsy knock of an unbeaten 47 and guided South Africa to a three-wicket win over India in the second T20I at St George’s Park on Sunday.
After India were kept to 124/6, Chakaravarthy got the visitors’ ahead by picking 5-17, his career-best figures in T20Is. But Stubbs timed his acceleration to perfection and hit seven boundaries in his vital knock to give South Africa a thrilling win with an over to spare, as the hosts’ have now squared the four-match series 1-1.
It also helped Stubbs that he found an able partner in Gerard Coetzee (19 not out off nine balls) to stitch a stand of 42 runs for the eighth wicket. What also helped South Africa was the Indian pacers not being up to the mark, especially in the last three overs and captain Suryakumar Yadav giving Axar Patel just one over with the ball.
Chasing 125, Ryan Rickleton and Reeza Hendricks hit two boundaries each, before the former heaved to deep backward square leg off a slower short ball from Arshdeep Singh and fall for 13. Chakaravarthy struck in his first over by castling Aiden Markram with a googly, before taking his second wicket by pulling his length back and outsmarting Hendricks with another googly.
The googly again yielded success for Chakaravarthy as he castled Marco Jansen right through him in the 11th over. The big match-up between Heinrich Klaasen and Chakaravarthy fell in the leg-spinner’s favour as the batter picked out long-off to perfection.
It was followed by Chakaravarthy getting the ball to drift in and straighten past David Miller’s outside edge to rattle the off-stump and complete his five-fer. Ravi Bishnoi entered the wicket-taker’s column when his googly castled Andile Simelane
Despite Stubbs hanging around, he never found the support from other end till Gerard Coetzee arrived. Coetzee danced down the pitch to club Arshdeep for six, before the duo took a four each off Avesh Khan. Stubbs heaved and edged off Arshdeep for back-to-back fours, before flat-batting and pulling for consecutive boundaries to get a pleasing win for South Africa in front of a carnival-like atmosphere at Gqeberha.
Brief Scores: India 124/6 (Hardik Pandya 39 not out, Axar Patel 27; Nqabayomzi Peter 1-20, Andile Simelane 1-20) lost to South Africa 128/7 (Tristan Stubbs 47 not out; Varun Chakaravarthy 5-17) by three wickets
