Cricket
Durban Super Giants Extend Lead in SA20 League 2024 with Dominant Win over Joburg Super Kings
The Durban Super Giants cemented their place at the top of the SA20 League after beating the Joburg Super Kings by 37 runs at Kingsmead in Durban on Monday evening.
Durban Super Giants thrash Joburg Super Kings
The Durban Super Giants cemented their place at the top of the SA20 League after beating the Joburg Super Kings by 37 runs at Kingsmead in Durban on Monday evening.
The Super Giants won the toss and posted 145/8 on a difficult pitch, thanks to a wonderfully timed half-century by their Proteas superstar Heinrich Klaasen.
The Durban side then showed their class, and variety, with the ball to restrict the Johannesburg side to 108/9 in allotted 20 overs.
It was the Johannesburg side’s second successive defeat after they lost to MI Cape Town on Sunday. Their first match against the Sunrisers Eastern Cape was rained out.
However, the Super Kings are not throwing in the towel just yet, and bowling coach Albie Morkel is confident that they can bounce back.
"It's always tough to start a tournament like this. We have got an experience side in the shed and great leaders. So you have no other option than to stick together as a unit," said Morkel
"We still have seven games left and hopefully we can turn it around. I'm sure we will.
"We're not batting well as a unit yet, but you can see from the way we field there is a good spirit in the team. T20 cricket is like that, you can turn it around quickly."
The Durban side, on the other hand, have now beaten MI Cape Town, the Sunrisers and the Super Kings in their first three outings in the SA20 League so far this season.
It was the best send-off for Durban Super Giants fast bowler Richard Gleeson, who leaves the camp to return home from the tournament.
"Three wins from three is pretty much the perfect trip for me. Unfortunately I do have to leave, but it's good to have the boys on top of the tree," said Gleeson.
Rollercoaster ride in the first power play
The first two overs were very quiet, with the Durban Super Giants scoring four runs off Joburg Super Kings Moeen Ali and Nandre Burger.
However, it was the quiet before the storm, as all hell broke loose in the next couple of overs.
Moeen Ali’s second over was very eventful, with opener Matthew Breetzke hitting a four and a brilliant six over the extra cover to get
However, his batting partner Quinton de Kock lost his wicket off the fourth ball when he mistimed a lofted drive straight down the throat of Reeza Hendricks at long off.
Burger’s next over produced even more fireworks. Breetzke thought he had nailed a short ball, but stood in disbelief as Romario Shepherd took an absolute blinder to get of the Proteas T20 batsman.
Shepherd flung himself goalkeeper style to his right to take a brilliant one-handed catch.
The action continued in the fifth over when the in-form Jon Jon Smuts was trapped LBW by Lizaad Williams. Smuts, who played a blinder in the Super Giants’ previous match against the Sunrisers Easter Cape, looked really unhappy with the pitch after the ball seemed to keep low.
The wickets put the brakes on the Super Giants’ innings. They recorded a powerplay of just 34/3 and it got even worse at the start of the very next over.
Veteran spinner Imran Tahir struck first ball after the power play and his spell, clean bowling Wian Mulder with what looked like slider or flipper, which bamboozled the Super Giants’ all-rounder.
Classy Klaasen shows his maturity with top knock
The Super Giants held their main batsman Heinrich Klaasen back in the number six position after the flurry of the wickets. The Proteas star then batted with a clear plan to put the bad balls away, but to also make sure that he stays at the crease for as long as possible.
Klaasen was involved in three key partnerships for the Durban side - a 39 runs with Keemo Paul, 38 runs with Nicholas Pooran and a 24-stand with Dwaine Pretorius.
The Proteas wasn’t exactly his brutal self, but still ended up not out on 64 from 41 balls, which included seven fours and two sixes.
Williams stars with the ball for Super Kings
The Joburg Super Kings would have fancied their chances to chase the target, especially after Lizaad Williams took 4/26 with the ball restrict the likes of Klaasen from really letting loose.
"We really put in a good performance in field and I thought the bowlers did well. We took some amazing catches. At the halfway stage we really felt that score was gettable," said Morkel.
Gleeson says the Super Giants were also targeting around the 150-mark following Klaasen's heroics with the bat.
At the innings break they believed their eventual score of 145 was a winning one.
"I think we were in a competitive position at the halfway mark. We discussed it in the changing room, getting close to that 150-mark," said Gleeson.
"I thought 130 may be enough to win the game, because the pitch was a little 'stoppy', up and down. So the bowlers always had a chance if you stuck it in the right areas."
Maharaj, the king of Durban
However, after a decent start, Maharaj spun the Super Kings’ batters in a web.
The Super Giants’ captain turned the ball off the straight, and picked up his Joburg counterpart with a magnificent delivery that pitched on the leg-stump and turned past the bat to hit the off-stump.
Reeza Hendricks was the only Super Kings batsman who seemed to be timing the ball well. Before Du Plessis’ departure in the fifth over he struck the ball so well.
But he found himself stuck at the non-striker’s end as Maharaj, Smuts bamboozled the visiting team with their spin, while the crafty Pretorius also found success with his variety of slower balls.
Maharaj bowled his four overs on the trot and got the wicket of Ronan Herrmann, while Pretorius pocketed Leus du Plooy. Smuts then picked up the big wicket of Donovan Ferreira, who tried to slog his way out of trouble, only to be caught in the deep by Pooran.
Hendricks, Ali the lone rangers for Joburg
Hendricks (38 off 32 balls) knew he had to make a play in the, especially after pace bowler Richard Gleeson returned to bowl.
But the Proteas white-ball opener lost his wicket to Gleeson’s very first ball of the 12th over, after the team had gone seven overs without a boundary.
Ali (36 off 26 balls) hit a couple of lusty blows towards the end of the innings, but lost his wicket in the final over to Reece Topley (3/19). In the end, though, it was too little too late.
Morkel alluded to the fact that it was possibly a good toss to win and batting first, as the wicket slowed down dramatically in the second half of the match.
"It was a difficult wicket for us to chase this down. We started well with Faf and Reeza, but Keshav came on and bowled really well for them," Morkel said.
"The rest of their bowlers also exploited the conditions perfectly. On a wicket like that - that is a little up and down - once you fall behind it's difficult to catch up."
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John Goliath is a copywriter and editor with 20 years' experience in the sports media industry. John, a Tottenham Hotspur tragic, studied journalism in the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and has worked for two of the biggest media houses in South Africa.