On Monday (IST), South Africa held their nerves in the last minutes of their virtual knockout match against West Indies, not just to make it through to the T20 World Cup semifinals but also set a new record for most consecutive wins in a single edition of the tournament.
After Co-hosts West Indies fell 1 run short of overtaking South African’s target of 135 runs, which they could only manage to score just 135/8, AB de Villiers and his men had lost two wickets before the rain stopped play. The match was eventually reduced to seventeen overs a side after a long break with a revised DLS target for Faf du Plessis’ charges as they had to fight for three-wicket victory against west indies team that sent them packing from the tournament.
This marked their seventh successive victory at the competition; with victories over Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Netherlands and Nepal during the group stage followed by wins over USA, England and West Indies in Super 8s.
The previous record belonged to Sri Lanka when they won six games in a row during the T20 World Cup in 2009 before losing in finals against Pakistan.
But this would not be first time South Africa have recorded seven successive wins in T20Is. This achievement was also made back both by AB De Villiers’ side in 2021 and Graeme Smith’s team back then too.
In addition, defending champions England who came second to group two have qualified for semis.
