India vs South Africa: Heinrich Klaasen helps South Africa chase down 149 and clinch 2nd T20I against India on tricky pitch | Cricket News – Times of India

India’s total of 148 for six wickets proved to be too small to defend even on a slower track that helped the seamers throughout as the visitors reached home with 10 balls to spare, winning the match by four wickets in the end.
After losing the toss to his South African counterpart Temba Bavuma on Sunday, for the second time in the ongoing T20 series, India’s stand-in skipper Rishabh Pant said India are going with the same XI that played the first match in New Delhi.

Justifying the team management’s decision of going with an unchanged XI in the second T20 International here at Barabati Stadium, Pant said at the toss, “We didn’t do anything wrong in the last match. We just need to improve the execution.”
But on Sunday evening, asked to bat first, as in the opening game of the five-match series, the Indian batters failed to execute their shots properly. Add to that a disciplined bowling by the South Africans on a two-paced wicket and you find India managing to reach a respectable total of 148.

Senior pro Bhuvneshwar Kumar led from the front returning miserly figures of 4-13 from his quota of four overs. But his new ball partner Avesh Khan (0-17) and medium pacer Harshal Patel (1-17) both were bowled one over less than their quota despite bowling in good areas and not giving away easy runs.
It was only because of Dinesh Karthik’s unbeaten 30 off 21 balls in the end that India scored 30 runs off the last two overs to reach a decent total to fight for despite losing wickets at regular intervals during the middle overs.

South African pacers varied their pace well to get adjusted to the nature of the slightly slower track of the Barabati and hit the right length to never give Indians any freebies.