 Yuvraj fashions India's thrilling series win
2nd Jul 2007 08:12 IST
Agencies
Earlier, put into bat in difficult conditions, South Africa ran into trouble straightway with comeback man Ajit Agarkar and Ganguly coming up with identical two-wicket bursts.
Keen to make his mark in the series after missing the first two matches with flu, Agarkar trapped in-form Morne van Wyk for a duck with his fifth delivery and then sent down gem of a delivery that hit a bamboozled Kallis' off stump past his flailing blade. Like van Wyk, the South African skipper too did not trouble the scorers.
AB de Villiers (15) got two lives in the eventful fifth over by Zaheer Khan when umpire Aleem Dar failed to sight a thick edge and, in the next delivery, Gambhir grassed a catch at short leg.
Ganguly, however, ensured that the opener did not make the most of the lives he got. On a condition that suited his bowling, Ganguly was in fact on a hat-trick after removing de Villiers and Jean-Paul Duminy (0) with successive deliveries.
de Villiers perished offering a bat-pad catch, while Duminy was rapped on the pad by a slightly faster delivery after an attempted flick.
Kemp foiled Ganguly's hat-trick bid even though he was not very convincing as he inside edged it to fine leg. South Africa found itself in a morass at 28 for four inside 13 overs.
Their back against the wall, Kemp and Gibbs decided attack was the best defence and counter-attacked with Piyush Chawla and Yuvraj bearing the brunt of the charge.
Zaheer eventually yorked Gibbs after a 67-ball knock of 56, which included three fours and two sixes.
Kemp's run-a-ball 61 came to an end in the final over when Tendulkar, hit for a six in the previous ball, castled him. Kemp hit five boundaries and two sixes in his knock. |
