The game against South Africa and Zimbabwe was full of thrilling moments right from the word go.
It was a rain-affected match that was reduced to 9 overs per side and eventually was declared no-result as South Africa couldn’t play the minimum quota of 5 overs as the rain showered again towards the end of the day.
One unusual incident happened in the penultimate over of Zimbabwe’s innings as they were gifted 5 runs because of Quinton de Kock’s mistake.
South Africa gifts 5 crucial runs to Zimbabwe
Anrich Nortje bowled full outside-off delivery to batter Milton Shumba. Shumba tried a reverse scoop in order to get a much-needed boundary but couldn’t connect.
The ball somehow reached toward deep fine leg as Ngidi threw it back to keeper De Kock. The South African keeper was trying to be a bit cheeky as he had dropped one of his gloves on the ground in order to try for a run out on the bowler’s end.
The throw from Ngidi was on the bounce to de Kock just as it reached, it made contact with the South African keeper’s pads and then touched with the glove lying in front of him on the ground.
All the spectators were surprised as the ground umpire signaled 5 penalty runs for the Zimbabwe team as only cricket pundits knew about this ICC rule.
However, this mistake didn’t cost the Proteas much as they restricted the Zimbabwe team to a par score of 79 runs in 9 overs courtesy of some great pace bowling.
De Kock came up with a super aggressive approach while batting as he played an unbeaten knock of 47 runs off just 17 deliveries.
However, De Kock’s superb knock went in vain as rain affected the game again and didn’t allow the African batters to chase down the total.
At the time of calling off, South Africa was on a score of 51 runs in 3 overs and the game was declared as a no-result as per the ICC rule which says both the teams must play at least 5 overs to get a result even with the DLS method.