SuperSport Park Centurion played host to South Africa and Australia in the first ever Pro20 International played at this stadium. The stadium employed extra grand-stands to ensure the crowd could swell to 20 000 cricket fans. With the atmosphere electric, the South African team came out to bat first.

Traditionally, SuperSport Park Centurion averages 140 runs in a Pro20 innings, which is not bad for a field on the Highveld that produces plenty of dew after dark. Robin Peterson was promoted up the order to open the batting with Herchelle Gibbs, which wasn’t a problem as he’s been opening the batting for the Warriors in the Standard Bank Pro20 series. Gibbs looked the part as he played freely, but fell quickly for 20 runs from 13 balls to the bowling of Nathan Bracken. Robin Peterson took the initiative from Gibbs and played to 34 runs off 27 balls, before he was bowled by Hopes trying to engineer a shot. Before Peterson was out, AB De Villiers came and went very quickly for a duck. Again he’s failed in the 20/20 format of the game. With the lack of runs starting to build pressure on the South Africans, Roelf van der Merwe stepped up on debut and hit 48 runs from just 30 balls on his home ground. The Proteas African ended their innings on a total of 156/5; a respectable total. A good bowling effort was needed to defend it.

The ever confident Australian batsmen came out and established control over the game from the first over. Assisted by some loose bowling from the South African openers Louw and Abdulla, the Aussies were looking good. Clark and Warner were playing shots and hitting boundaries, which came to an end when Warner was bowled by Albie Morkel for 20 runs from 15 balls. Ricky Ponting was next in and next out as he was caught behind by Mark Boucher for 1 run giving Abdulla his first wicket in international cricket. Clark continued through a partnership with David Hussey taking Australia to 101 before Hussey was out; caught. Captain Johan Botha came in to bowl and took control from the Australians in his first over, conceding only two runs from it. The slow paced bowling continued from the other end with Roelf van der Merwe also keeping the runs to a minimum. With the slow bowlers restricting the runs the Australians started to manufacture shots, as a result wickets tumbled from 101/5, 106/6 and eventually ending the innings 17 runs short on 139/8.

The speed at which van der Merwe scored his 48 runs and the control of Johan Botha’s 4 overs, for 16 runs taking 2 wickets were the influencing factors in The Protea’s victory. South Africa will go into the MTN ODI series confident on the back of 2 International Pro20 series victories.