SA salvage pride in last game of ODI series against Afghanistan

SA bounced back from two heavy defeats to beat Afghanistan by seven wickets in the last encounter of their ODI Series in Sharjah on Sunday.

Aiden Markram’s unbeaten 69 and 26 not out from Tristan Stubbs caused them to reach 170 for three wickets off 33 overs in reply to Afghanistan’s modest 169.

Afghanistan had skittled SA out cheaply to win the first match on Wednesday and then handed the visitors a 177-run thumping on Friday but were unable to replicate their form, even after again winning the toss and electing to bat in the third ODI.

Their innings was dominated again by the powerful hitting of opener Rahmanullah Gurbaz, who scored 105 in Friday’s comprehensive victory, which caused Afghanistan to go 2-0 up in the three-match series.

This time he fell 11 short of another century, smashing 89 off 94 balls before being snapped up on the boundary through a flying catch by Reeza Hendricks off the bowling of Andile Phehlukwayo.

But for the rest, the Afghanis were undone by poor decision-making and a little misfortune as they suffered three run-outs.

Rahmat Shah was run out when a ball that was hit back down the wicket by Gurbaz was deflected by the hand of bowler Lungi Ngidi onto the shoulder of the stranded Shah and onto his wicket.

Captain Hashmatullah Shahidi and Ikram Alikhil were slow in making their ground and were run out by quick thinking in the field with Afghanistan slumping to 132 for seven before Allah Ghazanfar contributed an unbeaten 31 off 15 to take them past 150.

SA were always on course to reach the target despite losing their opening three batsmen for 80 runs.

Markram was the aggressor with Stubbs in a supporting role as their unbeaten 90-run partnership saw SA home.

Reuters