Warm-up loss does nothing to affect Proteas’ confidence

Despite falling in a narrow defeat in their only warm-up match, Proteas batter Rassie van der Dussen says the well-settled national squad remain confident of putting up a fight as they target their maiden Cricket World Cup title in India.

After their first warm-up fixture against Afghanistan was called off due to the weather, the SA team were edged by seven runs (on the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern method) in their friendly clash with New Zealand in Thiruvananthapuram on Monday.

While their innings was restricted to 37 overs due to the weather, reducing potential time in the middle for the squad’s batters, they made full use of the game.

Nine players were given a chance with the ball, with fast bowler Lungi Ngidi and all-rounder Marco Jansen grabbing three wickets each.

In a rain-affected run chase, opener Quinton de Kock (84 not out) and fellow top-order batter Van der Dussen (51) both made half-centuries.

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And after getting some game time in local conditions, Van der Dussen felt they were in a good space heading into the quadrennial showpiece.

“It’s a good place to be. We’ve played together for a few years now, especially the batting unit,” Van der Dussen said after the match.

“Everybody knows each other’s games very well. We’ve seen it in our last few games against Australia (last month), and even tonight even though we lost on DLS, we were still confident of our position in that chase.”

New conditions

Arriving in Delhi on Tuesday, the Proteas had four days to prepare in new conditions for their opening match of the World Cup against Sri Lanka on Saturday.

Van der Dussen believed they would be ready to hit the ground running, and ultimately challenge for the global crown.

“I think we’ve got a good team. All the bases are covered and we’ve found a nice blueprint in different conditions on how to go about it,” he said.

“It’s a long tournament, but if we play well we will definitely have a chance.”

Meanwhile, Cricket SA confirmed Proteas captain Temba Bavuma linked up with the team in Delhi yesterday after returning home last week for personal reasons.