Soon after suffering a seven-run loss in the 2024 T20 World Cup final, South Africa captain Aiden Markram showed a brave face at the post-match presser. Having reached the summit clash unbeaten, South Africa looked comfortable in their first-ever World Cup title with just 30 runs needed off the last 30 balls of the chase. However, India bounced back and South Africa once again failed to reach the target.
“Hopefully it’s one step closer,” said Aiden Markram. “It’s tournament cricket, it’s tough cricket, it’s not easy to win trophies and you’ve got to take your hats off to a team like India for lifting the trophy. A lot of hard work goes into it. But yeah, we’d like to think we’re one step closer and hopefully moving forward we can get that first win and it can be a snowball effect of quite a few to come.”
“A great group of guys that’s been together for quite a long time now. Get to our first final, like I mentioned a few days ago, it’s something we can be proud of. Still, in our eyes, not good enough. You’re not satisfied with making a final, but still, I think it’ll take a bit of time for us to reflect back on all the good things that we’ve done, but obviously for the time being, it just hurts a lot,” he again stated.
Having lost the toss, South Africa got off to a brilliant start with the ball to reduce India to 34/3 inside the Powerplay. Rohit Sharma, Rishabh Pant and Suryakumar Yadav got out but Virat Kohli steadied the ship with Axar Patel and Shivam Dube as India got to a 175-plus score. South Africa too had a poor start on a decent batting surface at Kensington Oval but soon they returned to the game.
Quinton de Kock and Tristan Stubbs counterattacked after early wickets, setting the platform for Heinrich Klaasen who smashed all over the park. His onslaught made the target 30 runs needed with 30 balls left. Little did he and South Africa knew that they would still fall short of the target as well.
“It’s not a specific moment, it’s an overall game of 40 overs and if you look at a couple of moments potentially where you could have done better but all in all still proud of the performance we put together today in a final and to get close like that is something I’m just proud of. I thought the wicket played really well, to be honest. I think it stayed consistent throughout the game I didn’t see it changing a lot of our batters came off after getting out saying felt like a really good wicket so Hats off to the groundsman. Yeah, for preparing it a wicket that he did. It’s a great game of cricket to have a final like that on a good wicket, something in it for the bowlers, something in it for the batters. Just a good spectacle overall,” Aiden Markram again shared.
“It’s just gut wrenching – that’s really what it is. Each player has been on a different individual journey to get to this first final. Ultimately you become really tight as a group and you want good things to happen to this group because you know they’re great people and when you get really close like that, especially the nature of how the game went, obviously adds to the emotions and it’s one of those things but yeah, we can channel it moving forward but I think next couple of days you let it be, you let yourself feel the way you want to feel and then really start reflecting in a positive manner,” Aiden Markram concluded.
