Capitals claim SA20 final berth with win over Royals

Rilee Rossouw played pivotal roles with both bat and ball to help the Pretoria Capitals secure a berth in the final of the Betway SA20 on Wednesday night. 

Rossouw scored 56 off 41 balls as the Capitals scratched their way towards 153/8 and then with the Royals only just keeping in touch with the required scoring rate had Eoin Morgan caught on the cover boundary. 

This was a gripping encounter played on a pitch that served up sufficient aid to all the bowlers throughout the evening.  Far from being the free scoring Wanderers made famous in the 438 game or when AB de Villiers hit a century off 30 balls, on Wednesday the batters had to work for their runs. Those not prepared to do so, didn’t contribute. 

Rossouw was willing and able to do so for the Capitals who had topped the tournament log after the league phase. Normally such a free scorer, the powerful left-hander, after belting the third ball he faced for six, had to show patience, playing an anchor role — or at least one as it pertains to this format. 

He still scored at a strike rate of 136.58, but most importantly shared an important partnership of 41 for the sixth wicket with Eathan Bosch, that set the Capitals on the right track after they’d been knocked off kilter with the loss of their top order by the ninth over. 

The Royals’ bowlers had quickly cottoned on to the fact that pace on the ball was beneficial to the batters, and all of the seamers bowled cutters hard into the surface to cramp the Capitals, while also forcing them to create their own pace. 

Andile Phehlukwayo was the most successful of Paarl’s bowlers taking 3/29 but it was the contribution of the spinners Bjorn Fortuin (1/24) and Tabraiz Shamsi (2/19) that was most important. 

It was a ploy the Capitals would follow later when they bowled. 

Pretoria too made crucial early breakthroughs: Jason Roy’s dreadful tournament ended when he drove Bosch to Rossouw in the covers off the second ball of the innings and then Jos Buttler, so critical to the Royals’ fortunes, was bowled by one that darted back and kept low. 

While Paul Stirling engaged in a thrilling single over battle with Nortje and his high pace — carving a couple of fours and smashing a terrific six over long on — the Royals could never sink their teeth properly into the chase. 

The key partnership was between Miller and Morgan, two experienced players. That’s when Theunis de Bruyn, continuing to captain the Capitals in the absence of the injured Wayne Parnell, played his trump card — Rossouw. 

It was a mad over in which he dismissed Morgan, then had a decision for lbw go against him and then, so high on adrenaline was he, that he ripped an off-break across the right handed Evan Jones as if he were Ravi Ashwin, which was called a wide.

Miller tried desperately to find a partner, but wickets fell regularly and when he was out in the last over, superbly caught at midwicket by Colin Ingram, the Royals chances had sunk. 

For the Capitals — victors by 29 runs — a final back at the Wanderers on Saturday awaits. It will be against either the Joburg Super Kings or the Sunrisers Eastern Cape, who meet at SuperSport Park on Thursday. 

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