South Africa’s World Cup campaign brought five victories and three defeats – and several other interesting figures.
1. The 15th and final member of the squad, Aaron Phangiso played zero World Cup games. The spinner entered the equation, briefly, prior to the fixture against the United Arab Emirates – but ultimately never cracked the nod for the playing XI.
2. Morne Morkel took the most wickets for South Africa. Equal with Indian Mohammad Shami on 17 at the time of writing, Morkel clinched one more than Pakistani Wahab Riaz and four fewer than New Zealand’s Trent Boult.
3. Dale Steyn bowled the most among South Africa’s seamers, delivering 68.5 overs across eight matches. The workload inevitably took its toll, as the pace ace battled a hamstring injury during the semi-final defeat to New Zealand.
4. Kyle Abbott, who inexplicably wasn’t selected ahead of Vernon Philander against the Black Caps, earned South Africa’s cheapest economy rate. His 4.19 was rivaled only by Tahir’s 4.23. Wayne Parnell, after just one match, gathered the most expensive – 9.44.
5. South Africa bowled 22 maidens, almost a third of which came from Steyn. He bowled two more than Tahir’s five. Morkel’s four, two each for Duminy and Philander – and one apiece for Behardien and Abbott – completed the denomination.
6. Abbott also enjoyed the best bowling average, requiring just 14.44 runs for each of his nine wickets. His best figures of four for 21 came against Ireland at the Manuka Oval in Canberra.
7. AB de Villiers scored a resounding 482 runs – the most by any South African and third only to Sri Lankan Kumar Sangakkara (541) and New Zealander Martin Guptill (532) overall as of Tuesday. He’ll fall to fourth, though, if Indian Shikhar Dhawan scores 116 or more in Thursday’s second semi-final.
8. Unsurprisingly, de Villiers cherished the quickest strike rate – 144.31 – among South Africans who played more than four matches. Miller’s 139.05 was not far behind, while Duminy and Rossouw also ensured their runs were scored at substantially more than a run a ball.
9. Five of South Africa’s eight specialist batsmen averaged well over 50 at the World Cup. Only Hashim Amla (41.62) and Quinton de Kock (20.71) aggregated less. Farhaan Behardien, meanwhile, did not gain an average after finishing unbeaten on 10 and 64 in his two innings.
10. Rilee Rossouw took nine catches, remarkably as many as wicketkeeper de Kock. De Villiers, du Plessis and Amla were next in line with six each. Behardien probably would have had a second, had Duminy not erroneously interfered in the deep at Eden Park.
