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The South African cricket team successfully defended 208 runs against India in the first Test held at Newlands, Cape Town.
The Proteas began the day with 65 runs on the board with the loss of two wickets and were looking to gain a big lead.
However, due to the rain yesterday and due to the covers being left on the field for a long time, there was a lot left in the pitch for the bowlers. This led to India ripping through the South African batting line-up to dismiss them for 130.
Mohammad Shami and Jasprit Bumrah picked up three wickets while Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Hardik Pandya took two each.
India began the chase well as they didn't lose a single wicket for the first 30 runs. However, they soon crumbled and lost wickets at regular intervals.
Vernon Philander was the pick of the bowlers as he picked up six wickets, including three in the last four deliveries.
In the end, South Africa won the match by 72 runs to take a 1-0 lead in the three match series.
Here is how the cricketers on the field reacted to the loss:
Virat Kohli:
If we had taken our chances in the first innings, even after them counter-attacking, we could have kept them to 220. We're not a team which thinks of what-ifs though. We were thinking 250, 275 if they play well. It was a great effort by the bowlers. We needed someone to get a 75-80. Credit to them, they were a bowler short and still bowled their heart out. We need to rectify our mistakes also. Mini collapses in both innings is something we have to think about. This game is all about strining in partnerships. They did that better than us. Bowlers learned pretty quickly. We kept pulling things back against a side which is very strong about us. The mindset matters when you're traveling away from home. You need to grab scoring opportunities. He's (Hardik Pandya) a strong character. He's performing for us now, even away from home. That knock was brilliant.
Vernon Philander:
It's generally slow. It caught us off-guard on the first morning. To get 286 was a wonderful effort with the bat. What better setting can you ask for. One of the better grounds to play cricket at. Every time you have one bowler get the praise. Coming back after the break, I felt a bit stiff. Just hope Dale gets back as quickly as possible. To see him go down is quite heartbreaking for the squad.
Faf du Plessis:
Every single time when we needed to stand up through tough periods, we responded. Even today, after India got off to a decent start, we stuck to our plans. The first morning, we expected it to move around for the first hour. That total we felt was just around par. Plan was to get 200 runs, to get 350 and to have a crack at them tonight. But we were surprised how much it was doing. When we came in today, the pitch was green again, almost like the day 1 pitch. I think it was a fantastic cricket wicket. Really important in a three-match series to put the opposition under pressure. If we had four seamers here today, Dale would have been a handful. Feel sorry for the guy. He's trained so hard. Thanks to the crowd, been a great crowd.
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