Image Credit- AP
Anrich Nortje, who bowled South Africa to win in a pivotal encounter in one of the two groups of death with career-best T20I numbers, is refusing to accept the idea that a low-scoring game was a bad representation of cricket in the US. This was the first World Cup game to be held in New York, and the pitch was uneven and the outfield was slow, which made scoring very tough. Even though Sri Lanka only scored 77, they caused South Africa to perspire as they tried to reach the goal.
“I thought the game was great,” Nortje said when asked if this pitch was a fair reflection of the entertainment cricket sought to provide when it came to US. “I thought the entertainment was there. I thought the people were there. It was a brilliant spectacle. It was brilliant to see everyone, to hear the voices, the noise, the cheering. I thought it was a great day for cricket.
“It doesn’t always mean, correct me if I’m wrong, there needs to be 20 sixes in a game to make it entertaining. There’s still a lot of strategy that goes into the game. There’s a lot of skill that goes into the game, whether it’s sixes or fast bowlers or spinners, however it might be. So, I thought the game was a brilliant game. It was still a close game at the end of the day, another wicket or two, and things might have been different. We might have been in a little bit more trouble.
“It is great to be in New York. It’s great to be playing cricket in the US and…we’re excited for what’s to come. We’ve enjoyed the facilities; we’ve enjoyed the sort of getting around exploring as well. So, yeah, it’s brilliant and we are enjoying it.”
In preparation for the World Cup matches in New York, ten drop-in pitches were brought in. Twenty minutes from the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium is a training facility where six of them are installed for the nets, while four of them are located at the stadium used for the matches. When a few of their batters left the practice area the day before the game, South Africa had a rough idea of what to anticipate.
Heinrich Klaasen, who finally calmed the nerves down with a six and a four off a single Wanindu Hasaranga over, tended to go with the wider narrative. “I don’t think it’s ideal for T20 cricket, but it’s still a good entertaining game,” he said. “Nevertheless our bowlers bowled extremely well. The margin for error for the bowlers is also not as big as you think. It’s not easy for the batters. It took like almost a mixture of Test cricket, one-day, batting-wise to get over the line. Luckily we didn’t chase 120. That would’ve been very interesting.”
However, Klaasen was just as happy with the atmosphere as Nortje was. “I said to the coach the DJ was on point, there was no interruptions from his side and the crowd was fantastic,” he said. “You can see the people are excited for the competition.”