Toss: India opt to bowl vs South Africa
Having already conceded the ODI series and with no Super League points up for grabs, India made four changes and chose to bowl in what was a dead rubber at Newlands. R Ashwin, Shardul Thakur, Venkatesh Iyer and Bhuvneshwar Kumar made way for Jayant Yadav, Suryakumar Yadav, Prasidh Krishna and Deepak Chahar.
While India paired up offspinner Jayant with legspinner Yuzvendra Chahal, South Africa broke up their successful spin combination, swapping out left-arm wristspinner Tabraiz Shamsi for seam-bowling allrounder Dwaine Pretorius.
Captain Temba Bavuma said that left-arm seamer Wayne Parnell was also in contention to play his second ODI since being recalled to the national side after the Kolpak system ceased to exist. However, the 32-year-old fell ill on the eve of the game and hence missed out.
According to Bavuma, "anything over 300" would be a competitive total at Newlands, where South Africa have won 31 out of the 37 ODIs they have played before Sunday.
As for Rahul, he described the pitch as a "sticky" one and hoped for some early juice for his revamped attack. However, on the batting front, there was still no room for Ruturaj Gaikwad who was in prolific form in IPL 2021 and more recently in the 50-over Vijay Hazare Trophy, where he rattled off four centuries in five innings for Maharashtra.
South Africa: 1 Janneman Malan, 2 Quinton de Kock(wk), 3 Temba Bavuma(capt), 4 Aiden Markram, 5 Rassie van der Dussen, 6 David Miller, 7 Andile Phehlukwayo, 8 Keshav Maharaj, 9 Dwaine Pretorius, 10 Lungi Ngidi, 11 Sisanda Magala
India: 1 KL Rahul(capt), 2 Shikhar Dhawan, 3 Virat Kohli, 4 Rishabh Pant(wk), 5 Shreyas Iyer, 6 Suryakumar Yadav 7 Jayant Yadav, 8 Deepak Chahar, 9 Jasprit Bumrah, 10 Prasidh Krishna, 11 Yuzvendra Chahal
Deivarayan Muthu is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
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