Not even in their wildest dreams Australia would have imagined that their World Cup 2023 campaign would start in such a terrible fashion that they have lost their first two matches, the second one in quite a humbling manner.
After their loss to India by 6 wickets in Chennai, the Australians crumble, looking lethargic in the field, out of plans with the ball, and absolutely shellacked with the bat against Temba Bavuma’s South Africa team which has now laid a strong marker for being called a title contender.
In Lucknow on Thursday, Australia were handed a thumping defeat by 134 runs by the Proteas and because of this big loss, Australia’s NRR dips to -1.846. Although it’s very early in the tournament – they have 7 more games in the group stage left – but a group-stage exit, which would be failure to reach the semi-finals, is looming for the once mighty Aussies.
Pat Cummins won the toss and elected to bowl first in Lucknow. They couldn’t contain the attacking Quinton de Kock, who ramped home a century, scoring 109 runs in 106 balls. Bavuma and Rassie van der Dussen played around him before Aiden Markram whacked a fifty, scoring 56 runs in 44 balls.
Australia fluffed a total of 6 catches – yes, 6 catches dropped from Australia today – and misfielded a few. South Africa ended up with a total of 311, which was going to be tough given the invariable bounce in the pitch and a bit of pace.
That assistance was enough for the South African pacers to rock the Aussie batting order. Kagiso Rabada took 3 wickets, Marco Jansen took two wickets, Ngidi took one wicket while Maharaj and Shamsi took two wickets each.
At 70/6 in the 18th over, the match was all but done. Some contributions from the lower-order meant Australia dragged itself to a total of 177.
Memes galore on Twitter as Australia were defeated comprehensively by South Africa:
Quinton de Kock, Player of the Match said: “It was a great win for the boys, to be honest, we didn’t know how the pitch would play, we assessed the conditions beautifully and then applied ourselves well with the bat. The guys who spent time on the wicket, got a hand on the conditions and then used their scoring options. 311 was an above par score, I have played here for the Lucknow team.”
