If you were a South African fan waking up just as news of the toss at the Sydney Cricket Ground filtered through, nobody would have blamed you if you rolled over and went straight back to sleep. South Africa’s record while chasing in World Cups has been ghastly. Add to that their record in knockout matches, and expectations of the outcome on Wednesday were quite low.

But South Africa managed to find their mojo and deliver the exact opposite to what everyone expected. Their team line-up saw Rilee Rossouw retain his place and Kyle Abbott stay in ahead of Vernon Philander, and stuck with Quinton de Kock when he had a torrid time thus far. It showed that the team is not afraid to roll the dice when it comes to crunch time. South Africa’s bowlers were up against a team with two of the top five run-scorers in the World Cup so far, but you would not have said so on the day. Dale Steyn, Kyle Abbott and Morne Morkel did their bit in roughing Sri Lanka’s batsmen up, while Imran Tahir and JP Duminy combined to prod and poke the Sri Lankans into errors. De Villiers trusted his seam bowlers until the 15^th over, indicating intent and aggression the rattle the batsmen upfront. Dismantling partnerships early is integral to setting up a winning position and De Villiers’ crafty bowling changes, even with just four frontliners at his disposal, worked a charm.

The end result was that Sri Lanka was restricted to 133 in 37.2 overs, and two legends of the game were reduced to looking incompetent in their final match out. A hat-trick for Duminy underscored his all-round importance, while Tahir managed to avoid tearing a hamstring with his frequent running celebrations and chest thumping. Their efforts were helped by Sri Lanka’s batsmen having a blip with the bat, but South Africa’s attack did plenty to force those errors. Right from the get-go, they were charged up with energy in the field and the swagger that had been lacking at times during the World Cup had returned. The pace and aggression from Steyn and Morkel was there and the swing from Abott helped as well.

The batsmen never erred and even Quinton de Kock found some form, showing that there is value in consistency selection. The young gloveman notched up 78 off 57 and finally looked like the batsman he was before he picked up an injury.

“We all go through patches like he did in this tournament. We’ve all been in dark spaces, and I think he has been in this tournament. A lot of credit to the selectors, to the coach, the guys who kept backing him. I think they must have been tempted a few times to let him go and maybe for me to take the gloves, but it was a great call from them to stick with him,” said De Villiers.

“He had a fantastic game, took a couple of crucial catches. You know what can happen when you let catches go down. It can turn a game upside down, and he hung onto them today, and the way he batted with confidence was amazing. At that age to go through a patch like he has been going through, to come out there in a quarterfinals of the World Cup with confidence shows what kind of player he is and what he can achieve in his career, and I’m looking forward to the next few games to see him up the order again,” the captain added.

The win will be a massive confidence booster ahead of the semi-final in Auckland next week. South Africa will face the winner of the match between New Zealand and West Indies and should the former end up being their opponents, they will have memories from 2011 to contend with, but for De Villiers those memories, as well as the “c-word”, all form part of the package.

“I think we liked being called chokers, so we’ll just keep that tag and move along as long as we keep winning. It’s a great achievement from a team that, like I said before, came here to win the World Cup. Our next hurdle is the semifinals and we’ll try to find a way to get over that hurdle. Look, we still have hopefully two games to go. We haven’t won the World Cup yet,” the captain said. DM

Photo: South Africa’s Jean-Paul Duminy dives to field a ball during their Cricket World Cup quarter-final match against Sri Lanka at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) March 18, 2015. REUTERS/Steve Christo