Rassie van der Dussen says the Proteas are ready for their upcoming Cricket World Cup clash against hosts India when the two sides meet at the Eden Gardens on Sunday.
South Africa made 357-4 on Wednesday in Pune, with Van der Dussen scoring 133, his second hundred of the tournament, and Quinton de Kock scoring 114, his fourth. The two of them shared a second-wicket partnership of exactly 200 runs.
New Zealand was never in the game. They were out for 167 runs after being hit by both the Proteas’ fast bowlers and Keshav Maharaj’s spin, who took 4-46.
South Africa, which is trying to win its first World Cup, is now in first place in the 10-team table and almost certainly will make it to the semifinals.
India is the only team left in the tournament that hasn’t lost yet. On Thursday, they play Sri Lanka in Mumbai in their seventh of nine pool games.
Van der Dussen didn’t try to downplay how hard the task was for South Africa before their match with the in-form hosts in Kolkata on Sunday.
“Playing India in India is a massive event,” the 34-year-old told reporters in Pune.
“They’ve been playing really well…They’ve got all bases covered, a brilliant bowling attack and obviously the batting as well.
“But we’ll go into that game knowing that if we do the things well that we want to do, we’ll be in a really strong position. The challenge is to do that under pressure, to stay with that.
“But we’ve played them here before and we’ve beaten them here (in India) before. So even though it’s a World Cup, it’s not really too much different.”
Even though India won the series, South Africa beat them by nine runs in Lucknow in October 2022.
When these two teams played in Mumbai in 2015, South Africa beat India by 214 runs, with De Kock scoring a hundred and Kagiso Rabada, a fast bowler who is also in the current World Cup squad, taking four wickets.
De Kock’s innings on Wednesday made him the first batsman at this World Cup to score more than 500 runs. The left-handed opener kept up his great form in what the 30-year-old has said will be his last major tournament before retiring from one-day internationals.
“It’s been so good to have ‘Quinny’,” said Van der Dussen.
“He has a determination about him that I haven’t seen in a very long time. He’s ploughing back into the team in all aspects, in the bowling meetings, in the batting meetings, being one of our senior guys.”
Van der Dussen added: “The guys really feed off him. He’s one of my favourite guys to bat with. He really guided me through my innings today. At times I was under pressure and I was asking him about a few options.
“He’s such a cool and calm guy out there, thinks so clearly. It was just great to bat with him. But he’s been brilliant in the last few weeks.”
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