Another heartache for Proteas

David Miller and Morné Morkel will look back on South Africa's Champions Trophy match against Pakistan at Edgbaston in Birmingham last night with fondness, but their teammates won't.

Miller's 75 not out was a triumph of discipline over his natural attacking game, an innings of maturity, awareness and nous.

It rescued South Africa from the 61/3 they were in when he took guard in the 15th over and took them to a half-decent total of 219/8.

Morkel charged into the bowling crease with irresistible confidence to claim two wickets in his second over and another in his eighth, and all of them for only seven runs on his way to figures of 3/18 off seven.

But he could not stop Pakistan from reaching 119/3 in 27 overs when rain ended the match.

That made Pakistan the winners by 19 runs.

This means South Africa's match against India at The Oval in London on Sunday is a showdown.

Not only are South Africa highly likely to have to beat India to stay in the running for the semifinals, they could also have to win that match handsomely enough to survive the game of net run-rate roulette that might ensue to decide the issue.

AB de Villiers won the toss and chose to bat, despite a forecast for rain, and Quinton de Kock and Hashim Amla made a slow but steady start to the innings.

But, with 40 runs on the board in the ninth over, Amla was run out for 16.

Miller and Chris Morris kept the Pakistanis at bay in a stand of 47 that survived Miller being poleaxed by a yorker from Mohammad Amir and being given out leg-before for 47 - Miller referred the decision and the ball was shown to be missing leg - and Morris being cleanbowled for 22 by Junaid Khan with what was correctly called a no-ball.

Junaid ended the partnership legitimately in the 43rd over when he had caught Morris caught in the deep for 28.

That brought Kagiso Rabada to the crease to share a stand of 48, the biggest of the innings.

It was snuffed out by a fine running, diving catch by Hasan deep in the covers to dismiss Rabada for 26, his highest score in his 14 one-day innings.