Eoin Morgan hailed England’s bowlers after a two-run win over South Africa in the second Twenty20 international at Durban.
The tourists collapsed in the opener on Wednesday, losing by one run, to ramp up the pressure in the three-match series as preparations continued ahead of this year’s T20 World Cup.
Ben Stokes struck an unbeaten 47 and Moeen Ali weighed in with a remarkable 11-ball 39 to propel England to 204 for seven.
Quinton De Kock put Moeen in the shadow with a blistering 65 off 22 deliveries before the Proteas were left 26 to win off the final two overs.
Chris Jordan conceded 11 from the penultimate over, leaving 15 for Tom Curran to defend from the last, and the Surrey paceman held his nerve with three needed off the final ball.
England skipper Morgan said at the post-match presentation: “We’d have liked to win both. The performance was a considerable improvement from East London.
“South Africa had the better of the batting conditions but our bowlers came up trumps today.”
On Curran’s final-ball heroics, Morgan added: “It takes a lot of courage when the best ball to bowl is a gamble ball, the slower ball at the end. Fantastic catch by (Adil) Rashid, we go to Pretoria on Sunday at 1-1.”
Morgan also reserved particular praise for Jordan, who returned figures of two for 31.
He said: “He’s outstanding, one of our more experienced bowlers. He’s got a very cool, calm head on his shoulders. He seems to deliver when it matters. It’s a tough ground to bowl on here.”
South Africa captain De Kock was disappointed his side could not come out of the final-ball thriller on the right side.
He said: “It’s great cricket. Both teams are playing really good cricket at the moment. It was just unfortunate we didn’t come across the line.
“It was quite difficult. They bowled really well at the death, but I think we can get better. I’m sure the bowlers know that.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here