Bastard game, cricket

Times Media

TELFORD VICE, Auckland

AND so not to Melbourne. Not to the World Cup final. Not to the future. Not to anywhere but to the suddenly cold comforts of home. And back to the past and all its unanswered and unanswerable questions.

Twelve runs needed off the last six balls ... 10 off four ... six off three ... five off two ... Then a South African who has lived in New Zealand since 2001 hit a six, and the dashed dream ran down SA’s players’ faces and onto Eden Park’s cursed earth. The weeping will continue, inwardly and outwardly, for weeks yet; perhaps forever.

Joburg boytjie Grant Elliott, who was first drawn to cricket 23 of his 36 years ago when he bunked a day at St Stithians to watch SA play their first ever World Cup match - against Australia in Sydney - smote the fateful six off Dale Steyn to complete a perfectly pulseless 84 not out.

Elliott was suspended for missing school that day in 1992, and New Zealand’s four-wicket win on Tuesday, which puts them in Sunday’s final, means he will have to miss his sister’s wedding on Friday.

How can it be that two teams play one of the greatest matches yet seen but only one of them stays alive in the tournament?

How do SA keep coming out on the wrong end of the equation - even when they give it their everything, and ride the mad wave of adrenalin that makes intelligent men do stupid things?

To play below your potential and disappoint yourself is crushing. To get much more right than wrong and still lose is cause to look for alternative employment. SA reached that point on Tuesday.

Yes, they botched runouts and catches. Yes, there was alarm when Vernon Philander - who missed four of SA’s first seven games with a hamstring injury and looked flat when he did play - was named to replace Kyle Abbott - who stood in for Philander with verve and aggression and took 9/130 in those four games.

But, despite their errors, SA kept themselves in the game until Elliott hit the fateful six, and AB de Villiers did a fine job of boxing clever with his bowlers.

Besides, it wasn’t as if New Zealand didn’t make mistakes. They dropped four catches and were helpless to stop Faf du Plessis sharing stands of 83 and 103 with Rilee Rossouw and De Villiers, and David Miller from plundering 49 off 18 balls.

And that against opponents bold enough to line up five slips and let fly with two of the most bristling fast bowlers - Trent Boult and Tim Southee - in the tournament.

But then Brendon McCullum hit the ball with barely legal fury, and after five of their 43 overs New Zealand had crash-banged 71 of the 298 runs they needed to win.

De Villiers’ response was to call on Imran Tahir, who twirled and tweaked a maiden. Then McCullum pulled flaccidly at the first ball of the seventh over, bowled by Morne Morkel, and was caught at mid-on.

Eleven overs later, SA had also ridded themselves of Kane Williamson and Martin Guptill. Surely no-one could win it for New Zealand from there.

Could they ever. In what appeared to be an utterly emotionless stand that yielded 103 runs, Elliott and Corey Anderson carved the game into a shape they could grasp.

Their grip was prised loose when Du Plessis held a steepler that removed Anderson for 58. But Elliott was still there, and he wasn’t going to school or to a wedding or anywhere except to Melbourne to play in New Zealand’s first World Cup final.

Bastard game, cricket.