India Defeat South Africa In 4th T20I By 135 Runs: The Indian Cricket Team absolutely demolished South Africa in the fourth and final T20I of the series to take the trophy home as Sanju Samson and Tilak Varma scored fine centuries.
India Defeat South Africa In 4th T20I By 135 Runs
The fourth India vs South Africa T20I was played at the Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg. And for the first time in the series, India captain Suryakumar Yadav won the toss as he decided to bat first.
The duo of Sanju Samson and Abhishek Sharma walked out to open the Indian innings. While Samson, who scored two ducks in the past two games, got off the mark in an attacking manner, Sharma seemed to struggle in the early going, kicking the ball a couple of times in the early going.
The two then, as the Men in Blue have done throughout this series, started the inning with a high scoring rate. When Abhishek got out for 36 in the sixth over, the team score was 73/1. At this point, Tilak Varma walked in, and India never looked back in this match.
Soon after, Sanju reached his half-century, and then Tilak did. Samson, on occasion, focused on running between the wickets to bring Tilak, who looked in excellent touch, on strike. The team went past the 200-run mark in the 15th over.
While in his 70s and 80s, Varma was dropped on a couple of occasions. Then first, the Rajasthan Royals captain reached his ton and then did the Mumbai Indians batter. The two never stopped attacking, first taking India past 250 runs and then bringing the inning to a stop at 283/1 in 20 overs.
This was both Samson and Tilak’s second century in the series. While Sanju scored one in the first T20I before scoring two consecutive ducks, Varma scored one in the third T20I and won his team a close match.
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And then it came time for South Africa to come out and bat, which was a disaster from the start. Arshdeep Singh bowled Reeza Hendricks in the first over, while Hardik Pandya dismissed Ryan Rickelton in the second. By the time the third over ended, captain Aiden Markram and danger man Heinrich Klaasen had been dismissed too as the Proteas fell to 10/4.
From here, Tristan Stubbs and David Miller stabilised the inning, but the match was already over by that point. By the time Miller got out, the team score was 96/5. Then, on the very next delivery, Stubbs was dismissed as well.
Marco Jansen did provide a late-inning flourish with the bat as he scored 29 off 12, but the tail was quickly done away by the Indian bowling as South Africa was all out for 148 in 18.2 overs.
This 135-run win by India is the largest margin of victory in T20Is between these two nations. Earlier, the record was held by a 106-run India win at the same ground in December 2023.
While Sanju Samson scored 109 off 56, Tilak Varma was named the Player of the Match for his awesome 120 off 47. He was also named the Player of the Series after scoring two 100s in the series on the trot.
Next up for the Indian Cricket Team is the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, the five-match Test series against Australia Down Under. The first match of the series will be played on November 22 in Perth.
Check Out: India Defeat South Africa In 4th T20I By 135 Runs
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