Captain Steve Smith scored a breezy 44 to guide Australia to a six-wicket win over South Africa in the final Twenty20 International on Wednesday and a 2-1 series victory.
After electing to bat, South Africa posted 178-4 in their 20 overs, boosted by a magnificent unbeaten 97 from Hashim Amla.
However, Australia paced their reply perfectly and profited from a fine opening stand of 76 between Shane Watson (42) and Usman Khawaja (33).
Photo: AP
Those two fell in a single Imran Tahir over, but any thoughts South Africa had of clawing their way back into the game evaporated as a composed Smith, whose runs came from just 26 deliveries, and David Warner (33) added 79 for the third wicket.
Australia reached their target with four deliveries remaining, but never looked like falling short.
They head to India for the World Twenty20 where they are to open their campaign against New Zealand on Friday next week.
Opener Amla proved the anchor for South Africa’s innings as he caressed an unbeaten 97 from 62 deliveries that included eight fours and four sixes.
Quinton de Kock (25 from 13) and David Miller (30 from 16) provided impetus, but the innings slowed when Faf du Plessis and Rilee Roussow, in for the rested A.B. de Villiers, took 28 deliveries to score a combined 20 runs.
South Africa face England in their first match of the World Twenty20, also on Friday.
In-form Khawaja expects to be squeezed out of the Australia top order in favor of former captain Aaron Finch for their opener.
Australia tried different opening combinations in all three matches in South Africa, with Khawaja and Finch teaming up in the first in Durban and all-rounder Watson and Finch in the following match in Johannesburg.
Khawaja has plundered runs in all formats since being recalled for Australia’s Test series against New Zealand last year, but only made his T20 debut against India in January.
Finch boasts a fine T20 record and Khawaja said his more experienced teammate was likely to be the preferred choice.
“Finchy didn’t play today and he’s one of the best T20 players in the world, so we’ve got a lot of batting depth and strength,” Khawaja told reporters. “Finchy was there before I was, when I came into the team he was T20 captain. He’s been there and done it. I sort of expect him to come back into the team.”
“I’ve been on both ends of it and I’m just so nonchalant about it now. I’m just chilled out,” he said.
Australia were thrashed 3-0 on home soil by World T20 hosts and favorites India in January, but the South Africa series win was a timely boost, Khawaja said.
“We wanted to go into the World Cup on a winning note,” he said. “It’s always a little bit tougher when you haven’t. The fact that we won is a big bonus.”
“I think everyone just about in the squad has contributed somewhat in the last three games, which is nice,” he said.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier