Steyn uses Devil’s Number to bite Aussie biters

Times Media

TELFORD VICE, Cape Town

THAT Dale Steyn played his 87th one-day international in Harare on Saturday will resonate with Australians beyond the bigger truth that he powered SA to a comprehensive win in the triangular series final.

“The Devil’s Number,” is how Aussies refer to 87 because it is 13 away from 100. They regard the figure as the rest of the cricket world does 111, or “Nelson” - as a bad omen.

Australians should rename their superstition “Dale Steyn’s Number” after the key wickets of Aaron Finch, Phillip Hughes, Glenn Maxwell and Brad Haddin all waltzed like Matilda into the fast bowler’s swag bag on Saturday.

Thanks to Steyn, Australia totalled a mediocre 217/9. With Faf du Plessis delivering another decisive innings, this time falling four runs short of becoming the first player to score four centuries in a one-day series, SA won by six wickets with 55 balls remaining.

It was as convincing a hiding as SA have yet dealt any team, and the first time they have beaten Australia in a final in 20 years of trying.

But victory was not enough for Steyn, who needed little prompting to revisit the acrimony that tainted the Newlands test between the teams in March.

An angry exchange between Michael Clarke and Steyn during SA’s second innings prompted Steyn to level his bat at the Australian captain - which had the umpires adopting poses more often seen from boxing referees.

Clarke told the press he had apologised to the South Africans for what he said, and before he returned home from Zimbabwe with a hamstring injury last Monday, he said, “I would hope Dale and I have a good enough relationship. I’m pretty sure he would front me if he still had an issue with me. I think my apology at the time was well taken and respected by Dale.”

Clarke should think again.

“I haven’t spoken to him much since (the Newlands test),” Steyn said on Saturday. “I don’t take many things personally, but what he did say to me I did take personally.

“I know he apologised in the media and I should be playing this down, but the day he comes and shakes my hand and says, ‘I really mean what I said’ and behaves like the way he should, maybe then I will. But, right now, he’s not here. So I’ll wait until I get to Australia.”

The soap opera will doubtless resume when SA play three T20s and five ODIs in Australia in November.

What Clarke said to one of the more hair-triggered players in cricket to get his goat so effectively is not known, but the Aussie skipper’s tweets during his team’s innings in the final could be taken to suggest he has doubts over the legality of SA’s management of the ball.

“Reverse swing in the 28th over,” Clarke posted. “With two white balls this means it’s really the 14th over ... Hopefully we get it swinging as well ...”

That SA have been found guilty of ball-tampering twice since November will only add smoke to the fire, but AB de Villiers showed Steyn how not to stoke the flames.

“It’s a bit of bait - they just wanted us to bite,” De Villiers said of the Australians’ claims before the final that SA played “predictable” cricket.

“Well,” Steyn shot back with devilish satisfaction, “We do that.”