India in South Africa 2012

India to face South Africa in T20 this month

Nagraj Gollapudi

March 5, 2012

Comments: 100 | Text size: A | A

Jacques Kallis celebrates his third century of the series, South Africa v India, 3rd Test, Cape Town, 4th day, January 5, 2011
CSA will pay tribute to Jacques Kallis on the day of the T20 © AFP
Enlarge

India will travel to Johannesburg to play a one-off Twenty20 match against South Africa on March 30 at the Wanderers. The match, ESPNcricinfo has understood, was planned well in advance though it comes on the back of lengthy and hectic touring by both teams.

Ratnakar Shetty, the BCCI chief administrative officer, said India would send its first eleven for the match. CSA confirmed these matches would be an annual affair, following up on last year's Twenty20 game between the two sides at Moses Mabhida stadium in Durban as a farewell for Makhaya Ntini.

The Twenty20 takes place three days after South Africa finish their tour of New Zealand with three back-to-back Tests. It is also a week after the end of the Asia Cup, and five days before the start of the IPL in Chennai. "It will bring down the curtain on our home international season on an appropriate note," CSA chief executive Gerald Majola said, "before many of the players depart for India for the fifth edition of the IPL."

On the day of the match, CSA has organised a tribute for Jacques Kallis. "We want to make this a Jacques Kallis evening," Majola said, "in which we acknowledge his huge contribution to the Proteas and South African cricket generally as player, role model and mentor."

Kallis said he was humbled to be chosen for the tribute. "It is something I really appreciate," Kallis said. "Cricket South Africa has given me wonderful opportunities to live the dream I have had from the moment I picked up a cricket bat for the first time."

The final of the MiWAY Cup, South Africa's domestic Twenty20 tournament, was supposed to be played on March 30, but now has been shifted to April 1.

Edited by Siddarth Ravindran

Nagraj Gollapudi is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo

RSS Feeds: Nagraj Gollapudi

© ESPN EMEA Ltd.

Posted by Zaheerkhanis on (March 7, 2012, 9:59 GMT)

This is ridiculous. This is what happens when you idiots running cricket administration. Why would you have a team travel to SA to play a T20 match. In the already hectic schedule, this is just a waste.

Posted by India_boy on (March 7, 2012, 4:43 GMT)

even though its really ridiculous to have such games, more than half of the people here are pissed off that CSA invited India and not their team for this event, not a fair world eh !

Posted by   on (March 6, 2012, 10:33 GMT)

With BCCI, sanity never prevails. What purpose the match will serve still remains a mystery. And to top it all, to keep the players fresh for IPL, BCCI will be sending a second string squad and don't be surprised if Sehwag is selected.

Posted by Cricordia on (March 6, 2012, 7:03 GMT)

SUPER DISLIKE as they say in FB terminology.

Posted by newMachine on (March 6, 2012, 1:20 GMT)

Does this really make since?

Posted by skepticaloptimist on (March 6, 2012, 1:01 GMT)

@Vignesh Lakshman - The Boxing day has nothing do with cricket, or has no importance in or for cricket. The importance it has is for a few of the commonwealth countries; namely, RSA and Australia. Therefore, they have made it a rule to start a Test match. Plus, what Pakistani bowlers got was not a thrashing; it was a good, competitive game which India won after a great amount of toil. And yes, I'm an Indian, too.

Posted by vishal53 on (March 5, 2012, 20:31 GMT)

Well, what's the point of just one T-20? THey should really be having a series of maybe 2 T-20s or maybe and ODI match to follow after the T-20 match. When the South African Cricket Board requested India to send their best XI, SACB sense that they are looking for a tough fighting match. India should send the following: 1 Robin Uthappa, 2 Virender Sehwag, 3 Virat Kohli, 4 Suresh Raina, 5 MS Dhoni (capt & wk), 6 Yusuf Pathan, 7 Ravindra Jadeja, 8 Irfan Pathan, 9 Vinay Kumar, 10 Harbhajan Singh, 11 Praveen Kumar. Twelfth Man: Rohit Sharma

Posted by   on (March 5, 2012, 20:27 GMT)

This is Ridiculous fly to another continent for 1 T20 match. What a waste of time and money.

Posted by   on (March 5, 2012, 18:26 GMT)

So, once again BCCI, CSA and ICC continue using players as cattle. There's a need for a strong international player's union like a labor union to stop ICC from scheduling this kind of a fixture. This is brutal for both the teams.

Posted by   on (March 5, 2012, 18:21 GMT)

This is one of the components of the BCCI's purchase of the SA vote at the ICC. Nothing less, and likely a lot more under the table.

Comments have now been closed for this article

TopTop
Email Feedback Print
Share
E-mail
Feedback
Print
Nagraj GollapudiClose
News | Features Last 3 days
News | Features Last 3 days
Sponsored Links

Safe & simple online money transfer. Apply Now!

Available now at Cricshop