For the second time in three days, South Africa completely outplayed Zimbabwe in the ongoing T20I tri-series, effecting a 43-run win in Windhoek on Tuesday (September 1).
Fueled by Lhuan-dre Pretorius’s career-best 94, they posted 185/7,but the innings trailed off slightly with a flurry of wickets towards the end. In a leg-side heavy knock, Pretorius first combined with Jordan Hermann to get them off to a brisk start. They raced to 68/0 after the first seven overs.
Using plenty of leg-side whips and clips, strokes made possible with his unique downswing, Pretorius warmed up by attacking debutant Kundai Matigimu. From there on, he kept picking a boundary almost every over: his first six came in the ninth over, clearing the square-leg boundary off Wellington Masakadza. By the next over, he had ticked off his fifty, and South Africa looked set for a 200+ total.
On 58, Zimbabwe were presented with a chance, but a misjudgment from short-third man led to a spilled catch.
As the innings progressed, Pretorius got even smarter with picking his shots. Whichever ball was not in his hitting zone towards the leg-side, he smartly caressed past point on the off, using the pace and angle off quicks well. Dewald Brevis game him good company: against Matigimu, he hit back-to-back no-look sixes and kept using the crease well against spinners. He fell in the 16th over, trying to repeat a six off Brad Evans.
The rest of the batting collapsed trying to amp up the scoring from the other end. Cruising at 154/1, they lost six wickets for 31.
Zimbabwe’s response was positive to start with. Ben Curran struck a couple of fours in Kwena Maphaka’s opening over, while Brian Bennett greeted Prenelan Subrayen with a six. But Curran’s attempt to take on the same bowler led to his departure. Innocent Kaia continued the assault: by the third over, they were placed well on 33/1. But it went downhill thereafter.
Bjorn Fortuin, bringing himself in the attack, took out Bennett and Wesley Madhevere across three balls, the first one courtesy of a brilliant one-handed Pretorius catch. That double-wicket maiden meant Zimbabwe could only limp to 43/4 by the end of the Powerplay, with Duan Jansen accounting for Kaia.
Jansen then tore through them further, picking Ryan Burl and Tadiwanashe Marumani off back-to-back balls. Maphaka then picked up another in the ninth over to leave them struggling at 54/7. Sikandar Raza then put on a lone act, going after Nqabayomzi Peter with a spree of hits. A six from Raza’s bat escaped the Windhoek ground, with the cameraperson doing well to capture it lying on the barren land outside the premises.
Having taken 22 runs off Peter’s second over, Raza kept looking to attack the shorter boundary but eventually got stumped off Fortuin trying to repeat a six in the 14th over. No.11 Newman Nyamhuri did well to push them close to 150 with an entertaining knock, helped along by some sub-par fielding. But it was too little, too late.
Brief scores: South Africa 185/7 in 20 overs (Lhuan-dre Pretorius 94, Dewald Brevis 41; Wessley Madhevere 3-20, Brad Evans 2-33) beat Zimbabwe 142/10 in 17.4 overs (Sikandar Raza 45, Newman Nyamhuri 27; Bjorn Fortuin 4-24, Duan Jansen 3-21) by 43 runs.
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