South Africa cruised to a comfortable 102 run victory over Sri Lanka at the Cricket World Cup on Saturday after posting the highest total in World Cup history.
Australia’s score of 417 against Afghanistan in Perth in 2015 was the previous World Cup high. The Proteas beat that score.
Also, their score of 428-5 was the ninth best in all one-day internationals.
Kevin O’Brien of Ireland got his hundred off of 50 balls against England in Bengaluru in 2011. Markram then went on to make 106, breaking the record for the fastest World Cup century.
On Saturday, he got his first fifty off of 34 balls, and the next fifty took only 15 more balls.
It was the first World Cup game with three hundreds in the same innings. Rassie van der Dussen (108) and Quinton de Kock (100) also hit hundreds.
Then Kusal Mendis, Charith Asalanka, and captain Dasun Shanaka all got fifty runs, but Sri Lanka’s response was always going to be about limiting the damage.
“We wanted to win the game and that’s what we did. I can’t find fault with the batting. We were not quite clinical with the ball but we will take that confidence into the next game,” said South Africa skipper Temba Bavuma.
It was a bad day for Sri Lanka because two of their bowlers, Matheesha Pathirana (1-95), and Kasun Rajitha (1-90), let more than 180 runs score in 20 overs.
The South African team hit some big balls, especially since they were bowled out for just 99 runs the last time they played at New Delhi’s Arun Jaitley Stadium in October 2022.
“From a team like South Africa, we expected 350 anyway in these conditions. If we’d managed to keep them to 370 it’s manageable,” said Shanaka.
“We had the momentum especially the way that Mendis and Asalanka played. But their total was a little too much for us.”
De Kock hit his 18th ODI century off 83 balls, with 12 fours and 3 sixes. This is his last international tournament.
Along with Van der Dussen, De Kock scored 204 runs before being out on the next ball he faced, after reaching 100. He top-edged a Pathirana delivery to Dhananjaya de Silva at mid-on, which ended their partnership.
Van der Dussen quickly made his fifth century in this format. It took him 103 balls and 12 fours and 3 sixes to get there.
The 34-year-old was out in the 38th over when Sadeera Samarawickrama caught him on the long-on boundary. This was his 50th ODI.
The first wicket fell when Dilshan Madushanka trapped Bavuma lbw for just eight runs in the second over. This is when De Kock and Van der Dussen came together.
Markram didn’t give Sri Lanka a break. He got to fifty in just 34 balls, and he and Heinrich Klaasen (32) took the Proteas past 350 runs in the 44th over.
Markram hit 14 fours and 3 sixes in his hundred.
He got 18 runs off of Pathirana, a young sling-action fast bowler who Sri Lanka coach Chris Silverwood had called the likely “X Factor” for the World Cup 24 hours before.
Markram was finally out when he skied the ball off Madushanka to Rajitha in the deep.
In the last few overs, David Miller hit two sixes and 39 runs off of 21 balls, making things even worse for Sri Lanka.
Marco Jansen, a fast bowler from South Africa, got two early wickets by bowling Sri Lanka’s openers Pathum Nissanka (0) and Kusal Perera (7) out clean.
Mendis hit 158 against Afghanistan last week as a warm-up game. For a short time, he gave Sri Lanka hope.
The 28-year-old got to fifty in just 25 balls, but Klaasen caught a 140 km/h delivery from Kagiso Rabada and brought an end to his fight.
Mendis scored 76 runs with four fours and eight sixes, and Asalanka scored 79 runs with eight fours and four sixes.
Shanaka also helped restore some honour with a score of 68, which was the first time in 14 innings that he scored more than 25.
Photo by Deepak Malik/Shutterstock
