With South Africa’s 10-wicket win against Australia on Saturday, not only it was curtains for the Proteas in this edition of the World Cup, South African veterans Imran Tahir and JP Duminy also bid adieu to their ODI career.
Batsman JP Duminy and spinner Imran Tahir had announced their retirement from ODI cricket following the conclusion of the competition even before the tournament had started.
Unfortunately, both stars couldn’t get a proper farewell as South Africa failed to make it to the knock-out stage. The South African campaign never got off to a great start as the side lost four of their first five encounters to make a rare early exit from the World Cup.
It was only during the later stage of the competition that South Africa made a comeback as they won two out of their last three matches to finish seventh on the points table with as many points from nine matches.
Despite his team’s dubious performance, Tahir had a decent outing in England and Wales. He finished with 11 wickets from 9 matches with an economy of 4.92. Tahir opened the bowling for his side in most of the matches and regularly gave them early breakthrough. On Saturday also, Tahir dismissed Australian skipper Aaron Finch off the first delivery of his second over. In the end South Africa won the match by 10 runs.
Pakistan-born Tahir made his debut for South Africa against West Indies in New Delhi during the 2011 World Cup. In eight-year-long ODI career, Tahir picked up 173 wickets in 107 ODIs at an average of 24.83 and economy of 4.65. His best bowling figure of 7/45 came against West Indies in Basseterre in 2016.
Here’s how Twitter bid farewell to probably the best ODI leg spinner of the decade:
Meanwhile, South African middle-order batsman JP Duminy also played his last ODI in national colour on Saturday.
Duminy had a disastrous World Cup, managing only 70 runs from 4 innings. With the ball also, he could hardly make any difference. One of the two players to take a hat-trick in last edition of the World Cup, Duminy could only account for one wicket this time.
Duminy, who made his ODI debut 15 years ago in Sri Lanka, finished with 5117 runs from 199 matches. At an average of just above 36, Duminy has 4 hundreds and 27 fifties to his name. A handy offbreak bowler, Duminy also took 69 wickets in his ODI career at an average of 45.55.
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