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South Africa's batter Janneman Malan heaped praises on his opening partner Quinton de Kock after South Africa's series-clinching 2nd ODI win against India at Boland Park on Friday.
Quinton de Kock (78) and Janneman Malan (91) rose to the occasion with the bat as South Africa defeated India by seven wickets in the second ODI to gain an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match series. For South Africa, Rassie van der Dussen and Aiden Markram remained unbeaten on 37 each. Some outstanding spin bowling from Tabraiz Shamsi, Keshav Maharaj, and Aiden Markram helped restrict India to 287/6 in the first innings, despite a typically vibrant 85 from Rishabh Pant seemingly having set the away side up for a far bigger total. Quinton de Kock set the standard in the chase with an early salvo that put the Proteas ahead of the required rate, with each of the South African top five contributing as they reached the target with 11 balls remaining. "Quinton made it easy for me at the start," said Malan in the virtual press conference after the match. "I just tried to give him as much strike as possible because I just wanted to let him go do his thing. He played a couple of ridiculous shots, which are good signs." "He is one of the best batters in the world when he gets going, so it was good to bat with him," he added. Talking about facing Indian bowlers, Malan shared his experience as batter said: "Guys like me who have seen them bowling at IPL and international level. So it was good to go out against them. You need more time to face guys like those because you need to get the rhythm of each one of them. So it was a kinda challenge for me to do it in the first and second game." "It's obviously not the best bowling conditions but they are a world-class team and bowlers so it's good to have a challenge from them," the 25-year-old added. The partnerships among SA batters are one of the major factors in Proteas' successes in this series. Shedding light on that, Malan said: "We were happy to have two hundreds in the previous game, and maybe we could have had me or Quinny getting to a hundred, but I'm very proud of the partnerships we had." "We had a hundred partnership and two 50 partnerships, which means the batters are coming in with good plans and good intent and building nice partnerships to make it easier for each other. It's a very good sign," he added. (ANI)
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