'Let the emotion seep in, it will hurt' - South Africa skipper Temba Bavuma on humiliating loss against Netherlands in ODI World Cup 2023

When cricket fans around the world were just trying to process the defending champion England’s loss against Afghanistan another World Cup upset took the cricketing world by storm yesterday when the Netherlands toppled South Africa in a rain-curtailed match in Dharamshala. 

This is the second time in the last 11 months that the Netherlands edged out South Africa from the T20 World Cup last year in November in Australia. Though this time the loss will not be as detrimental to South Africa as it was the last time it has jolted which was their smooth World Cup campaign till now.

On the other hand, defeating South Africa is a momentous occasion for the Dutch Cricket team as it is their first win in the 50-overs World Cup against a strong test-playing nation that too South Africa who won their two matches quite convincingly and were considered hot favorites to win the tournament.

South African Skipper’s reaction after the loss

Proteas captain Temba Bavuma wasn’t pleased with the outcome of the match and expressed his disappointment after the loss. Bavuma mentioned that losses of this kind hurt and it’s important to let the emotion sink in as South Africa was considered the overwhelming favorite to win this match.

But at the same time, he mentioned that it’s just a hiccup that the outcome of this sole match won’t decide the fate of their World Cup journey. At the post-match, Bavuma said, “You have to let the emotions seep in, there’s no point trying to forget what’s happened, it’s going to hurt and it should hurt. But we’ll wake up tomorrow and get back onto the journey, the campaign is not over by any stretch of the imagination, but we have the emotion and hurt.”

Extras turned out to be fatal for South Africa

The skipper mentioned the extras that South Africa conceded with the ball and how they played a major role in their defeat against the Netherlands. Bavuma said,” The challenge is always to come back and replicate, 32 extras is always going to hurt you, I don’t know if it’s a complacency thing. The fielding wasn’t up to standard, those are questions the guys will have to answer themselves, where they were mentally, but that’s not the standard we want to show from a fielding point of view,”

Batting was a big letdown for South Africa

It was a rain-curtailed start and South Africa got off to a great start with the ball and had the Netherlands six down for 112 but a valiant partnership between the Dutch captain and Roelof van der Merwe got them out of jail to an above-par score of 243 in 43 overs under challenging conditions.

Still, the South African team was expected to chase the target against the inexperienced Netherlands team but the Dutch had some other plans and they came out to the field with a plan as they started with their spinners upfront and kept getting wickets at regular intervals which led to the downfall of the second team. Though it will be a tough pill to swallow for the Proteas given their recent form it is expected of them to make a comeback in the tournament.