Former England captain Michael Vaughan.
Image: AFP
Former England captain Michael Vaughan has called the Proteas “the stupidest team” of the recent T20 World Cup.
Vaughan was referring to the Proteas victory over the West Indies in the Super Eights stage of the competition.
At the time, Aiden Markram’s side had just thrashed eventual champions India, which negatively affected the co-hosts net run-rate, and had two Super Eights matches remaining against West Indies and Zimbabwe.
The Windies, meanwhile, had also blown Zimbabwe away to boost their net run-rate ahead of their two potentially tougher matches against the Proteas and India.
A West Indies victory over the Proteas would have left India on the brink of exiting the tournament as they then not only needed to beat the Windies and Zimbabwe their final two matches, but also do so by a significant margin to improve their inferior net run-rate.
"South Africa has to be the stupidest team of the tournament,” Vaughan said on Sky Sports’ Stick Cricket podcast.
“If they had allowed the West Indies to win against them, India would have been knocked out.
“By winning that game, they allowed the juggernaut to beat Zimbabwe, the West Indies in a kinda quarter-final, beat England.”
Fellow pundit, fellow former England captain Alastair Cook, indicated that the Proteas had not qualified for the semi-finals prior to the Windies clash.
Vaughan’s response was: “They had to play Zimbabwe next … “, insinuating the African nation were mere cannon fodder. “I’m just saying had they (Proteas) lost to India that day, India would not have won the World Cup.”
The Proteas went on to beat Zimbabwe by five wickets in their final Super Eights match, but India had gathered momentum by scoring 256/4 to beat Zimbabwe by massive 72 runs.
It boosted their net-run rate to the point where they needed just a win over the Windies, which they duly achieved in a tense run-chase when they crossed the line with four balls to spare.
India’s batting unit was now in over-drive as they scored 253/7 and a record 255/5 in the respective semi-finals and final against England and New Zealand to lift their third ICC T20 World Cup trophy.
Fellow pundit David Lloyd termed Vaughan’s theory “a gamble”, while former England spinner PhIl Tufnell showed off his disgust at the suggestion that the Proteas should have essentially thrown a game at the T20 World Cup in order to knock out an opponent.
After a seven-game winning streak, including the group matches and Super Eights, the Proteas were knocked out by nine wickets in their semi-final against New Zealand in Kolkata.