The Momentum Proteas ended their Commonwealth Games campaign with a massive 10-wicket win over Sri Lanka at the Edgbaston Cricket Ground in Birmingham on Thursday. Unfortunately, it was too little, too late for the South African Women’s team to go on to compete for a medal.
Both nations went into the match with zero chance to progress to the semi-finals, after going winless in their first two respective matches against New Zealand and England.
Coming off an ODI and T20 series whitewash against England ahead of the Commonwealth Games, fighting for silverware was always a tough ask. However, they made sure to wrap up their time in Birmingham with some wonderful memories.
A ruthless performance
After winning the toss and choosing to bowl first, South Africa soon had Sri Lanka’s ladies on the ropes. Shabnim Ismail dismissed Hasini Perera with the very first ball of the innings. Masabata Klaas then got rid of Harshitha Samarawickrama cheaply in the second over of the match before Nadine de Klerk went on the rampage.
De Klerk ended her spell of four overs with figures of three-for-seven, and Klaas two-for-seven in three overs.
Career-best T20I bowling figures ✔️#SAvSRI #B2022 pic.twitter.com/FoTWFlGyeu
— Cricket South Africa (@OfficialCSA) August 4, 2022
That played a massive part in Sri Lanka being bowled out with just 46-runs on the scoreboard.
The Momentum Proteas openers, Anneke Bosch and Tazmin Brits, had little trouble getting to the minuscule total. They scored the winning runs in the seventh over.
🚨 RESULT | SOUTH AFRICA WIN BY 10 WICKETS
Openeers Tazmin Brits (21*) and Anneke Bosch (20*) wasted no time in chaing down the 47 runs needed for victory in just 6.1 overs after the bowling unit dismissed Sri Lanka for 46#SAvSRI #B2022 pic.twitter.com/kK5cC5mYRd
— Cricket South Africa (@OfficialCSA) August 4, 2022
“At the end of the day, it’s been a tough tour,” said Momentum Proteas head coach Hilton Moreeng.
“We are very happy with the end result. It shows that the disciplines we wanted to improve finally came through for us.”
“It’s been one of those tours where you get half chances. Some of the chances that we didn’t take swung the game the other way. But, today we were very sharp and spot on regarding that. Each and every game we created enough chances and we didn’t capitalize. That was the difference today”
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