India and South Africa are currently playing the 3rd and the final ODI of the series at Cape Town. With wins in the first two ODIs, the home team has already sealed the series and is aiming for a clean sweep. India, who have only won a single fixture on the tour, are eying to sign off from SA with a win.
Both the teams had some changes for the 3rd ODI. Indian skipper KL Rahul made as many as 4 changes and benched Bhuvneshwar Kumar, R Ashwin, Shreyas Iyer and Venkatesh Iyer. Jayant Yadav, Deepak Chahar, Suryakumar Yadav and Prasidh Krishna made it to the playing XI for the first time on the tour.
The absence of Shardul and Venkatesh was a big surprise as India don’t have a pace-bowling all-rounder in the playing XI now. Iyer’s absence also meant that the visitors are without a 6th bowler.
In the absence of a 6th bowler, Rahul handed the ball to Shreyas Iyer, who bowled two overs in the 3rd ODI. ‘Shreyas Iyer’ became one of the top trends on Twitter after he was given the ball and the netizens came up with different reactions.
Talking of the game, SA made a solid comeback after losing early wickets and rode on Quinton de Kock’s 124 to breach the 200-run mark. de Kock added 144 runs for the 4th wicket with Rassie van der Dussen, who was dismissed for 52 off 59.
de Kock smashed multiple records during the 17th ODI century of his career. The wicketkeeper-batsman now has 6 centuries against the Men in Blue and is only behind Sanath Jayasuriya on the list. The former Sri Lanka opener hit 7 tons against India.
Apart from that, de Kock has leapfrogged Adam Gilchrist on the list of most centuries by a wicketkeeper. He now sits next to Kumar Sangakkara, who hit 23 ODI tons.
