South Africans star on Saturday as the group stages of the SA20 come to an end.
In the first game the Sunrisers Eastern Cape hosted the Paarl Royals at St. George’s Park.
The Sunrisers won the toss and elected to bat first on a wicket that seemed to suit the bowling side.
Throughout the day the wicket continued to deteriorate and got harder for the batters as the match progressed.
The Sunrisers scored 148 runs for the loss of 8 wickets at the end of their first innings.
The standout performers for the Paarl Royals was Bjorn Fortuin who bowled 4 overs and took 2 wickets for just 20 runs.
Eshan Malinga bowled 4 overs and took 2 wickets for 21 runs whilst Mitchell Owen bowled 3 overs and went for 36 runs whilst taking 2 wickets.
The majority of their batters tended to struggle throughout the match aside from Jordan Hermann and Tristan Stubbs.
Jordan Hermann came in at number 3 scored 53 runs off 38 balls where he seemed to play the pull shot very well. Unfortunately he got out caught by Andile Phehlukwayo off the bowling of Eagan Malinga.
Tristan Stubbs came in at number six and scored 43 runs off 27 balls where he played the off drive quite well and got caught by Phehlukwayo off the bowling of Mitchell Owen.
Unfortunately the Paarl Royals were unable to chase the score down and they got bowled out for 100 runs in 18.2 overs.
Rubin Hermann came in at 3 and scored 35 runs off 39 balls where he got caught by Overton off the bowling of Liam Dawson.
Andile Phehlukwayo also showed some resistance scoring 22 runs off 24 balls hitting two fours and one six.
Phehlukwayo was given out LBW off the bowling of Aiden Markram.
The following Sunrisers players performed admirably in the second innings: Craig Overton bowled 4 overs and went for 15 runs by taking 3 wickets.
Marco Jansen bowled 4 overs and went for 22 runs whilst taking 3 wickets during his spell.
Sunrisers Captain Aiden Markram bowled 3 overs for 15 runs and took wickets to help his side win the match.
The second match of the day took place at the Wanderers between the Durban Super Giants and the Joburg Super Kings.
The Super Kings won the toss and elected to bowl first.
The Durban Super Giants managed to score 173 runs for the loss of just 4 wickets at the end of their 20 overs.
Heinrich Klaasen scored 76 runs (not out) off 47 balls. As is usually the case with Klaasen, he was very strong off his legs on the leg side.
Wiaan Mulder helped support Klaasen by scoring 30 runs (not out) off 22 balls where he hit 3 fours and 1 six.
The following players bowled well for the Super Kings during the first innings: Donovan Ferreira, Lutho Sipamla and Hardus Viljoen.
Ferreira bowled 3 overs for just 16 runs with no wickets.
Sipamla continued on his decent run of form by bowling 4 overs and taking 1 wicket for just 24 runs.
Hardus Viljoen took 2 wickets for just 42 runs off his 4 over spell where he dismissed the key batters of De Kock and Williamson respectively.
Initially the Super Kings were required to score 174 runs off their 20 overs, however, due to rainfall in Joburg DLS adjusted the score requirement to a total of 147 runs off 16 overs.
At the end of the second innings the Super Kings scored 135 runs for the loss of 9 wickets off their 16 overs and ultimately JSK lost by 11 runs (DLS Method).
Donovan Ferreira was the standout performer with the bat scoring 51 runs off 22 balls hitting 2 fours and 5 sixes before getting out caught by De Kock off the bowling of Pretorius.
Throughout his innings he played pull shots off all the bowlers quite well. The only other batter to score above 20 was New Zealander Devon Conway who scored 21 runs off 24 balls before getting out caught by Noor Ahmad off the bowling of Naveen-ul- Haq.
The outstanding bowlers for the Durban Super Giants were: Noor Ahmad and Dwaine Pretorius. Noor Ahmad bowled 4 overs and took 3 wickets for just 25 runs whilst Dwaine Pretorius bowled 1 over that went for 9 runs where he fortunately picked up two wickets.
Unfortunately, the captain Keshav Maharaj struggled tonight by bowling just 3 overs that went for 40 runs with no wickets.
The standard of fielding by the Super Giants and Super Kings also made it difficult for batters to judge length properly.
This rounded up all the group games for the teams that have qualified, as MI take on PR and SEC take on JSK in the knockout phase.
MICT’s final game will be against Pretoria Capitals at Newlands.
