South Africa defeated India by seven wickets in the second Test to level the three-match series 1-1 . After two sessions were lost to incessant rain, South Africa, chasing 240, came out needing 122 runs for a memorable win with eight wickets in hand. Proteas skipper Dean Elgar led from the front with an unbeaten 96 off 188 balls to take his team home in 67.4 overs.
The other crucial contributions came from Aiden Markram (31), Rassie van der Dussen (40), Keegan Peterson (28) and Temba Bavuma (23 not out off 45).
India’s bowlers could not extract enough from the surface with Mohammad Shami getting the only wicket to fall on the day.
The third and final Test begins in Cape Town from January 11.
Meanwhile, India’s batsmen need to better seize their chances and aim for longer partnerships if they are to bounce back from their Test defeat on Thursday and still win the series in South Africa, said Head coach Rahul Dravid in a post- match interaction.
“The wickets in the first two Tests have been a little challenging, I will give that to the batsmen. But we pride ourselves on wanting to do better and the batting unit certainly can look to maybe seize a few key moments and when we get those partnerships, maybe make them a little bit longer,” he said.
“In the first innings the ball sort of tended to kick up a little bit, but we could have probably got maybe 60-70 more runs.”
India were bowled out for 202 in their first innings, to which the hosts replied with 229. India then scored 266 in their second innings on a deteriorating pitch to set South Africa an imposing target of 240, which they reached with seven wickets to spare after a doggedly determined batting performance.
“Certainly we’d like to bat a little bit better. We need to keep improving and getting better. Maybe some of the guys who got starts could have converted those into hundreds,” added Dravid.
