South African skipper Faf du Plessis showed his content by bringing down high-flying Bangladesh into earth as the hosts were clean swept in the two-match Twenty20 series on Tuesday. South Africa clinched the series cleanly when they defeated Bangladesh by 31 runs at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium following their 52-run win in the opener. The Tigers were bowled out for 138 runs chasing Proteas 169-4 that also looked to have marked an end to their memorable run that began with their maiden quarter-final appearance in the World Cup.
The Tigers came into the series with sky-high confidence after they had clinched two consecutive one-day international series against Pakistan and India.
‘Definitely they batted incredible against Pakistan and India so their confidence would have been sky high,’ Du Plessis told reporters on Tuesday.
‘So it was important for us as a team to try and put an end to that confidence and we did it as a team.
‘It’s good leaning into the one-dayers,’ said Du Plessis.
The skipper said that Tigers were unable to match them in their batting approach that he believed was their recipe to success.
‘You need different skills in different times and I think that was probably the difference between the two teams,’ said du Plessis.
‘Our skills when it came to not hitting boundaries, hitting it in the space, taking the strike, taking twos and threes I thought we did better than them.
‘Where as they obviously tried to hit boundaries and in these conditions, it’s not always as easy, you have to graft a little bit put the bowlers in the pressure and hit a boundary.
‘I think in that sense you need power but you also need to earn the right to get to that stage where you can get the power hitters in,’ he said.
Debutant leg-spinner Eddie Leie, who became man of the match with 3-16, said that he was happy to contribute and looked forward to carry on with his leg-spin in the coming days.
Leie destroyed the backbone of Bangladesh’s batting with his exploit and the leggie said that he managed to do it as he kept his bowling formula simple.
‘In South Africa I try to keep it simple, just bowl wicket to wicket, and I tried to do the same here.
‘If you look at Bangladesh today [Tuesday], they started well. So for me the duty was to keep it simple and keep them off from taking runs.
‘The turn obviously encouraged me. I am just happy that I made my debut for my country,’ Leie said.
-With New Age input
