Summing up
Given the slight gloom that has enveloped English white-ball cricket in the past couple of weeks, that was a surprisingly emphatic win, that most of us didn’t call halfway in after a stop-start batting performance against an impressive South African attack. But the tourists’ batting was flimsy and England’s bowling masterful, from star of the summer Topley and Willey to the two spinners, Rashid and Moeen, and we have a properly intriguing decider at Headingley on Sunday.
And here’s Daniel Gallan’s report from Old Trafford. Thanks for all your comments and tweets, only a fraction of which I could respond to due to the frenetic nature of of the game. Bye and have a good weekend.
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Liam Livingstone also swung by for a chat with the Sky team, with some insight into how he and Curran lined up the bowlers. “We had to scrap hard to get to a score,” he admits, “and then Toppers and Dave were brilliant with the ball and then Rash did brilliantly with a wet ball – it was a pretty satisfying win. Sometimes you’ve got to give yourselves a chance and assess the conditions and get yourself in and then you wait for your match-up to come, Sam with the spinners and me with pace. I was waiting for the seam to come back on to attack. while Sam told me he’d have a go at Maharaj.
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