Sign in

Australia beat South Africa by 47 runs in last ODI

Australia bounced back to finish the one-day international cricket series against South Africa with a convincing 47-run victory at the Wanderers. SA still won the series 3-2 and retained the Number 1 spot in the world ODI rankings.

Updated on: Apr 18, 2009, 11:01:41 IST
AP | By , Johannesburg
Share
Share via
  • facebook
  • twitter
  • linkedin
  • whatsapp
Copy link
  • copy link

Australia bounced back to finish the one-day international cricket series against South Africa with a convincing 47-run victory at the Wanderers.

HT Image
HT Image

South Africa still won the series 3-2 and retained the Number 1 spot in the world ODI rankings.

Australia's total of 303-7 initially looked like it could be reached on a good wicket, but the Proteas dropped from 150-1 to be all out for 256 less than 20 overs later.

South Africa lost captain Graeme Smith for 20 with the score on 46. His opening partner Herschelle Gibbs, who hit a century in the last match, hit 10 fours and a six in the 101 balls he faced, before falling for 86. Going for a sweep shot, he was trapped in front by off-spinner Nathan Hauritz.

Gibbs and Jacques Kallis added 104 for the second wicket in 20.3 overs, with the all-rounder hitting 64 off 69 balls, with six fours and a six.

Smith, Kallis and J P Duminy (3) all went caught behind off forcing shots, the first two to Bracken and the latter to Johnson.

A B de Villiers (38) was the only other home-side batsman to contribute a decent score, but he was bowled by a Ben Laughlin full-toss to be seventh man out on 229 in the 43rd over.

Fast bowler Mitchell Johnson finished with 3-58 for the best analysis, although Hauritz took the man-of-the-match award with his 2-34 in Friday's match.

The spinner helped slow down the scoring rate in the middle of the Proteas innings and claimed the valuable wickets of Gibbs and Albie Morkel (5). Morkel was out to a stunning catch high on the square-leg boundary by Laughlin, where the fielder did well to stay inside the boundary ropes.

Earlier, Michael Clarke and Brad Haddin put on a 27-run opening stand for Australia before South Africa hit back to restrict the visitors to 303-7.

Ricky Ponting (40) and Callum Ferguson (41) got starts before being dismissed as South Africa took 7-119 in the middle overs.

However, Michael Hussey (49 not out) and Hauritz (24 not out) added a 57-run partnership in the final 10 overs to boost the total.

South African part-time spinner Duminy took 3-48 and left-arm spinner Roelof van der Merwe 2-44 to slow the scoring.

After Clarke and Haddin had put on their second hundred stand in as many matches, Haddin sliced a ball high from Morkel and was caught by Duminy in the covers in the 20th over.

Get the Cricket Live Score! including IPL Matches and track ICC rankings shifts, Cricket Schedule, and Players Stats along with detailed score profiles of Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill.