Varun Chakravarthy (5/17) conjured up a sensational spell, yet India didn’t have the last laugh at St George’s Park in Gqeberha (formerly Port Elizabeth) on Sunday as South Africa somehow managed to squeeze themselves out of the jail to win the second T20I by three wickets and level the series 1-1.

Put into bat, India struggled right from the onset, losing Sanju Samson, their centurion from the last match, off just the third ball of the game. Thanks to a few late strikes from Hardik Pandya (39 not out off 45 balls), India laboured their way to 124/6.

Despite the poor score, India were in with a great chance of making the scoreline 2-0 as the Proteas looked clueless before Chakravarthy’s wrong’uns. However, local lad Tristan Stubbs (47 not out off 41 balls) and pacer Gerald Coetzee (19 not out off 9 balls) unleashed their strokes to perfection when South Africa needed 37 off the last four overs.

South Africa v India - St George's Park, Port Elizabeth, South Africa - November 10, 2024 South Africa's Tristan Stubbs celebrates after scoring the winning run Reuters

The hosts’ counterattack took off in the 17th over when Coetzee hammered Arshdeep Singh for a huge six. Stubbs finished that over with a four when the left-arm quick dished out a full toss.

Arshdeep’s pace colleague Avesh Khan too got his length wrong as Coetzee smashed fours in the first two balls of the 18th over. Thereafter, with 13 needed off the last 12 balls, Stubbs ensured a botch-up like the one in this year’s T20 World Cup final in Bridgetown didn’t recur.

The youngster, banking on his good form, had earlier shown the application required against spin which the other Proteas batters didn’t. Having gone through the grind, he waited for the spinners’ overs to end before breaking free.

Not waiting till the deciding over, Stubbs found the gaps and also muscled the ball to the fence, smoking Arshdeep for four boundaries as South Africa reached the target with six balls remaining.

The St George’s Park track had extra bounce with a bit of seam movement on offer, which the South African bowlers had made good use of.

Their spinners had also stifled the Indian batsmen, especially Pandya.

When South Africa batted, they looked out of sorts against Chakravarthy and couldn’t score much off Ravi Bishnoi and Axar Patel either. Maybe captain Suryakumar Yadav erred in not giving left-armer Axar another over or two.

Earlier, India never recovered after Samson was castled by Marco Jansen in the very first over. Perhaps, Samson should have been more judicious in his shot selection.