Centurion, Jan q4 A superb bowling performance helped Pretoria Capitals hand Sunrisers Eastern Cape their second bonus-point defeat of the SA20 Season 3, beating the defending champions by six wickets here on Tuesday.
Capitals' captain, Rilee Rossouw won the toss at the Centurion and elected to bowl at the short of form back-to-back champions. That decision proved justified when the men in orange slipped to 4/3 inside two overs and then 50/6 before Marco Jansen and Simon Harmer finally established a meaningful partnership. Jansen (51 off 35 balls, 4x4, 3x6) was the main protagonist of their 40-run stand, but when Harmer fell to fellow spinner Senuran Muthusamy the end of the innings was near... with them soon being bowled out for just 113 -- under-par for even a tricky Centurion pitch.
For their part, the Capitals made a solid enough start as Will Jacks raced to 27 off 23 balls. However, his wicket -- alongside those of Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Kyle Verreynne, and Rossouw -- kept the Sunrisers believing there was a chance when they were reduced to 61/4 in the ninth over. However, an unbeaten 55-run partnership between Liam Livingstone (14 not out, 1x4) and Marques Ackerman (39 not out, 2x4, 2x6) carried Capitals, with Ackerman's six off the last ball of the 16th over sealing the bonus point.
The Pretoria Capitals' captain credited Livingstone and Marques for making the win possible. "We started really well with the ball. Experience of Livingstone at the end and Marques played an excellent knock (to take us past the line). On a tricky wicket, we wanted to take it as deep as we could and they played it really well to get us the bonus point," said Rilee Rossouw.
Sunrisers Eastern Cape captain Aiden Markram said there was big room for improvement for the two-time defending champions.
"Would like to think we are a better outfit than that. Not going to blame it on the toss. Big room for improvement (with the bat). Saw some really good stuff from the bowlers. Not the ideal day for us," he said.
Asked what was going wrong for his team, Markram said, "Quite hard to try and think about that now. Probably a case of T20 games coming thick and fast. When you look for form and games keep coming, it can be tough. We have some great players and hopefully, we can get the job done soon. Not a big fan of issuing directives and telling guys how to play. You just want to encourage them to be their best version. If you get off to good starts, you get to good scores - those basics still apply. We will never throw the towel in, and hopefully we can start playing some good cricket," said the former South Africa white-ball captain.
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