Capitals crush Super Giants to stretch lead in SA20 series

Producing a dominant all-round performance, the Pretoria Capitals shone with bat and ball on Friday night, racing to an emphatic eight-wicket victory over Durban’s Super Giants as they extended their lead at the top of the SA20 standings.

With the visitors chasing just 81 runs for victory at Kingsmead, Kyle Mayers got revenge for his own duck in his team’s innings when he had opening batter Phil Salt caught behind by Heinrich Klaasen with the first ball of Pretoria’s innings.

Match-winning partnership

The Super Giants bowling attack failed to make further inroads, however, as Will Jacks and Theunis de Bruyn combined in a match-winning 78-run stand for the second wicket.

Jacks hammered 56 runs off just 25 balls, including five fours and four sixes at a strike rate of 224.00, and though he was removed in the seventh over, he did enough to carry them home.

De Bruyn was unbeaten on 21, with the Capitals coasting to 84/2 as they wrapped up a convincing win with more than 12 overs to spare.

Earlier, the hosts never really got going after winning the toss and electing to bat.

Capitals skipper Wayne Parnell struck early, removing Mayers with the first delivery of the innings before he had Wiaan Mulder trapped leg-before for just five runs in the third over.

Batters restricted

The rest of the Super Giants top order tried to launch a recovery, but they were well restricted, with only in-form Klaasen (31 off 24 balls) scoring more than 20 runs.

And once Klaasen was dismissed by spin bowler Adil Rashad, the home side’s last four wickets fell for just 14 runs as they were bowled out in the 19th over for a poorly compiled total of 80.

ALSO READ: New SA20 league is capturing the interest of local cricket fans

Senuran Muthusamy was the best of the Pretoria bowlers, returning superb figures of 3/12 from his four overs to secure the Man-of-the-Match award.

While the Capitals moved further clear at the top of the table in the inaugural SA20 league, earning their fourth victory in five matches to open a six-point gap on the second-placed Sunrisers Eastern Cape, the Super Giants continued to struggle in second-last position after being handed their third defeat of the competition.