South Africa saw off a spirited fightback by the USA led by Andries Gous and won the first Super 8 match of the 2024 T20 World Cup by 18 runs in Antigua. Quinton de Kock blazed a 26-ball half-century as he put the USA under all kinds of pressure early on. South Africa ended up crossing 100 inside 10 overs in Antigua after the USA won the toss and chose to bowl first. The Americans then pulled things back and yet, South Africa managed to put up a score of 194/4 in their 20 overs.
Aiden Markram, said, Gous played well. Made life tough for us. Couple of tidy overs from us and the margin could have been better. But lessons learnt. Nice start. At the half time, the wicket changed a little. It got slower. They bowled well. We would have loved to finish with a bang. Couple of lessons to take. Big for us that Quinny got his flow. Everyone else just chipped in. Couple of overs we could have tidied upon. A few executions here and there might have let us down. The wind was strong so I feel the bowlers have done a decent job.
Aaron Jones said, I don’t wanna say disappointed. I thought we could have been more disciplined with the ball. But it goes this way sometimes. I think we need to be more disciplined. We will try and go back to the board. And come back stronger. Happy to be going home. I know the conditions well.
Quinton de Kock, Player of the Match, said, There have been a few tricky wickets, nice to spend time out there. USA put us under pressure, it was a great game. Just trying to focus on scoring runs, rest of it will take care of itself. We have had a few tricky wickets coming into this game, so it was great to be out there. We still have a few games to win, we are coming up against big teams. It was a good game, but it changes next time. Different venue, different team, so you never know what’s out there.