South Africa’s AB de Villiers en route to his brilliant unbeaten 162 against the West Indies during the Cricket World Cup match at the Sydney Cricket Ground yesterday.   (Reuters)

 

By Dileep Premachandran /The Guardian


What can you say about AB de Villiers? Imran Tahir, the leg spinner whose five-wicket haul was instrumental in pushing West Indies towards a record-equalling 257-run defeat to South Africa yesterday, was asked how he would bowl to the South Africa captain if he had to.
“I’d probably bowl him a beamer or two – two beamers, and I’m out,” he said with a massive grin. Elsewhere, deep in the bowels of the SCG, there must have been a couple of West Indies bowlers who wondered why they had not thought of that.
When he is in this mood, De Villiers, who scored 162 not out, is nearly impossible to control. Like the football playmaker who sees the entire field while directing his passes, he has no blind spots. He can shuffle two feet outside off stump and lap sweep you over long leg for six – as he did to Andre Russell – or he can shimmy away to the leg side and carve one inside out over extra cover. Jason Holder, West Indies’ captain, conceded nine in his first five-over spell. The next five went for 95 runs, with 64 of them coming in overs 48 and 50.
For de Villiers it was a third successive World Cup century against his favourite opposition, following on from 146 in Grenada (2007) and 107 not out in New Delhi (2011). It came 40 days after a 31-ball hundred against Holder and his men at The Wanderers in Johannesburg.
That day, he hit 16 sixes. On Friday, there were only eight but he compensated with 17 fours distributed in an arc that went clockwise from fine leg to third man.
De Villiers spoke of having felt ‘flat’ when he walked out to bat, with South Africa 146 for 3 in the 30th over. Rilee Rossouw, brought into the side in place of the injured JP Duminy, struck a pugnacious 31-ball half-century to build the momentum, and after coasting in his slipstream, De Villiers unveiled the repertoire of shots that has no equal in the modern game.
After getting to 50 in 30 balls, he needed just 22 more deliveries for his hundred. The next 14 balls went for 57.
Russell should have run him out off his own bowling when De Villiers had 94, and there were half-chances spilled late on but for the most part the ball cleared the fielders and the rope by yards. A deflated Holder spoke of how hard it was to keep De Villiers subdued, and no number illustrated just how West Indies fell apart as much as the 150 they conceded in the final 10 overs of the innings.
This was the venue where South Africa’s dreams of winning their maiden World Cup fell victim to the notorious rain rule in 1992. And after a crushing 130-run defeat to India last Sunday, the critics were once again questioning South Africa’s big-tournament credentials. This performance went some way towards answering the doubters, as Tahir and Kyle Abbott, playing in place of the injured Vernon Philander, impressed with the ball.
Tahir’s aeroplane celebrations to extra cover were as entertaining as his assortment of leg breaks, googlies and flippers, while Abbott knocked over Chris Gayle and Marlon Samuels, the two centurions against Zimbabwe, in his first two overs.
De Villiers, not content with having batted the opposition into submission, provided one of the fielding highlights as well, diving to his left at midwicket to dismiss Jonathan Carter off Morne Morkel’s bowling.
Holder’s 56 was spit in the rain as West Indies folded, going from 52 for 2 to 63 for 7 before the tail ensured that they would avoid the ignominy of the heaviest ODI defeat. They now journey to Perth to take on India without Darren Bravo after the batsman was ruled out of the remainder of the World Cup with a low-grade tear to his left hamstring, an injury the 26-year-old picked up in pool victory over Pakistan. He will be replaced in the West Indies squad.
South Africa, emphatically back on track, prepare to take on Ireland, the Pool B dark horses, in Canberra.


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