South Africa booked their place in the T20 World Cup semi-finals following their three-wicket victory over West Indies at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium in North Sound.

South Africa faltered to 110-7 when Roston Chase claimed three wickets in their chase of a revised 123 off 17 overs, but they managed to reach their mark when Marco Jansen struck the opening ball of the last over for six.

At the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium in Antigua, South Africa won the toss and held the West Indies to 135-8 thanks to a performance by player of the match Tabraiz Shamsi, who finished with 3-27.

After combining with Kyle Mayers (35 off 34 balls) for an 81-run stand at the third wicket, all-rounder Chase top scored with 52 and gave the West Indies hope by taking 3-12 with his off-spin.

When Jansen hit the last six off Obed McCoy, his undefeated 21 helped the Proteas win at 124-7.

“The last time I played here I went for 50 runs and there was a lot of chatter going around,” said Shamsi.

“I was happy to come back and perform my role, but credit as well to the guys who bowled before me because they set it up beautifully.”

The left-arm wrist-spinner, who was brought in to replace seamer Ottneil Baartman, received great assistance from captain Aiden Markram (1-28) and fellow slow bowler Keshav Maharaj (1-24).

Anrich Nortje dropped Chase on eleven, but he took advantage of the situation, hitting three fours and twice cleared the ropes.

After the hosts lost by five runs in the second over, his collaboration with Mayers enabled them to rally.

After Mayers was out for a sliced catch at deep cover by Shamsi, South Africa was able to contain the West Indies thanks to a succession of wickets.

With the score at 117-6, Nortje atoned for his previous miscue by running out the lethal Andre Russell, who had blasted two sixes in his 15 off nine deliveries.

“This is one batting performance we will try our best to forget,” said West Indies captain Rovman Powell.

“It was a commendable bowling effort by us. We said at the halfway mark that we were going to give it our all and the guys really gave everything to defend that total.”

During the frantic chase, winning captain Markram acknowledged feeling nervous.

“There’s a lot of relief at making the semi-finals but we’re not going to be brainwashed by that because we would have liked to be a lot more convincing,” he said.

“Maybe we tried to kill off the game too early, but that’s been the story of the competition so far.

“We get ourselves into tricky positions and then have to battle to get over the line.”

South Africa and England are the Super Eight Group 2 semi-final qualifiers.

Photo by T20 World Cup Twitter