South Africa crushed England by 80 runs to win the 2nd ODI at the Rosebowl in Southampton and take a 1-0 lead in the series. Hashim Amla scored a majestic 150 for the visitors before the bowlers wrecked the England batting line-up to set up a comfortable win.
Earlier South Africa won the toss and elected to bat on a bright and sunny day in good batting conditions at the picturesque Rose Bowl. The wicket was predicted to get slow and aid spin later in the day. England thus made one change from the 1st ODI at Cardiff- they brought in Samit Patel in place of Chris Woakes. South Africa played an unchanged squad.
Smith and Amla got off to a steady start but Finn and Anderson bowled a tight and testing opening spell and were difficult to get away. The batsmen did not try anything fancy but still kept the scoreboard ticking. After the mandatory powerplay, the visitors had reached 49 with all their wickets intact.
They started to accelerate soon and had put on 89 when Smith skied one off Bresnan for an easy catch to Kieswetter. The South African skipper departed for a well-crafted 52. Amla took charge and continued from where he had left in the Test-series. Bresnan was taken for plenty. Amla and Duminy took the visitors past the 100 mark and were batting well until a complete mix-up resulted in the southpaw's run-out. Elgar was sent in ahead of de Villiers to keep the left and right combination going.
He failed to impress and was cleaned up by Swann off a peach of a delivery. Amla continued on his merry ways and together with an attacking de Villiers took South Africa past 200. He soon brought up a brilliant 10th century at quicker than a run-a-ball in only his 59th ODI. The knock included 12 boundaries and came off just 96 balls. He became the quickest player in history to 10 ODI hundreds.
de Villiers, regarded as one of the best batsmen in contemporary cricket across all 3 formats reached another milestone. He became the 4th fastest to reach 5000 runs after Greenidge, Lara and Richards- the 3 great West-Indian batsmen. The batting powerplay resulted in 38 runs.
de Villiers was soon dismissed by Swann trying to accelerate the innings. Amla took charge and was given good support by du Plessis. He placed and timed the ball beautifully like an artist at work. He was finally dismissed for 150 off a mere 124 balls. He had raced from 100 to 150 in just 28 deliveries. Amla, during the course of his innings became the fastest man to score 3000 ODI runs.
He reached the landmark in only his 57th innings breaking Vivian Richard's record who had taken a good 12 innings more. South Africa ended their innings at 287 for 5. The spinners did a decent job for the home team. Swann returned with figures of 2 for 50 while Patel was economical conceding just 47 off his 10 overs.
England got off to a disastrous start losing their captain, Cook to a fantastic Tsotsobe yorker of just the second ball of the innings. The onus was now on Ian Bell and the stylish right-handed batsman counter-attacked with a flurry of cuts to the boundary.
England reached their 50 in just 9 overs with Bell on 33 off 25 balls. Trott was playing his part rotating the strike and getting the odd boundary until against the run of play he scooped one in the air towards fine leg. Dean Elgar took a brilliant backward running catch and broke a good partnership between him and Ian Bell. England had moved onto 64 for 2 after 12 overs.
Ravi Bopara came out into the middle and much was expected of him and Bell. But Bell's honeymoon was soon to get over. Robin Peterson produced a peach of a delivery to get rid of Bell for a fluent 45 off 41 deliveries- the ball pitching on the off-stump and straightening sharply to completely bamboozle the batsman.
The left-arm spinner gave England a double jolt by getting Bopara caught at extra cover by du Plessis. England were now in deep trouble at 90 for 4. They were just getting fed up of the name 'Peterson'! It was turning out to be a bad omen for them. Till a few days ago, it was Kevin and today Robin had wrecked their middle order!
Kieswetter came out and straight away launched Duminy for a huge six over long-on. But his short and sweet innings of 20 soon came to an end when Dean Elgar got him caught at slip off a leading edge. The home team were now reeling at 118 for 5.
Samit Patel and Eoin Morgan tried to resurrect the innings and added a 41 run partnership for the 6th wicket before Morgan fell to Duminy. England had moved to 159 for 6. They lost another 2 wickets on that very score as Parnell struck a double blow to get rid of Bresnan and Swann. Both did not bother to disturb the scorers and were dismissed for a duck. The match was well and over. Samit Patel and Steven Finn provided a few fireworks towards the end of the innings. South Africa won by 80 runs.
South Africa had unofficially become the No.1 team across all 3 formats. It was a humiliating defeat for England. They need to do some serious introspection before they take the field at The Oval on the 31st. To add salt to their wounds, Kevin Pietersen hammered a brilliant century for Surrey today!
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