South Africa: 8/0
Australia: DNB
Match abandoned due to rain
When AB de Villiers sits back and reminisces about his glorious career one day, he will remember that persistent rain was the standout feature of both his 100th Test and 200th One-Day International which led to the abandonment of both matches.
Instead of last night’s Tri-Series match against Australia in Barbados being a celebration of De Villiers’s amazing talents, it was just like November's Bangalore Test a period of complete frustration for the South African captain.
South Africa were denied the opportunity of qualifying for the Tri-Series final with a game to spare and were forced to share the points with the Aussies instead. Both teams still have one more match against the Windies remaining, but the world champions now face a must-win match against the hosts on Tuesday at the same venue.
A West Indies victory would, however, provide the Proteas with automatic qualification as South Africa currently top the table with 11 points – one point ahead of second-placed Australia. Conversely, should Australia defeat the Windies, it would leave the Proteas having to win their final round-robin tie on Friday.
De Villiers’s only duty on the day was to walk out and toss with his Australian counterpart Steve Smith, who called correctly and inserted the Proteas under cloudy skies at the Kensington Oval.
The Proteas skipper would probably also have elected to bowl had he called correctly, especially after the inclusion of the extra paceman Morne Morkel at the expense of spin bowler Tabraiz Shamsi. The Barbados ODI was Morkel’s first appearance in this Tri-Series after sitting out the matches in Guyana and St Kitts.
The national selectors obviously believed that the Kensington Oval offered more pace and bounce than the previous venues in this series as it would have been the only occasion thus far that the Proteas would only play one specialist spinner in the form of the impressive Imran Tahir. South Africa have played either two – or sometimes even three – specialist spinners in its preceding matches.
Morkel’s return gave South Africa’s attack a more familiar pace-orientated feel with the lanky seamer joining Kagiso Rabada and all-rounders Wayne Parnell and Chris Morris in four-pronged seam attack.
Australia, too, reverted to their traditional strengths for the clash at this most storied of Caribbean venues. Although the Kensington Oval pitch no longer carries the mantle of being one of the quickest surfaces in the world like it did during its glory years, the world champions still made three changes from the defeat to the Windies in their last match with Glenn Maxwell, Mitchell Starc and Scott Boland replacing Travis Head, Adam Zampa and Nathan Coulter-Nile.
Starc was ultimately the only bowler to get an opportunity to let loose when the left-armer delivered the only over of the match before heavy rain swept the ground. Starc, who in the build-up to this match admitted that it's been “frustrating” to only play two out of Australia’s four matches in the series thus far despite being fully fit, showed his match rustiness with a wild opening over.
Last year’s World Cup Player of the Tournament sent down three wides and a half-volley that Quinton de Kock creamed to the cover boundary to push South Africa to eight without loss after the opening over.
Unfortunately for the local fans who had come to see these global superpowers in action, there was no further play as the umpires eventually called it off at 6:25pm local time.
IOL