Amazing drama due to Corbin Bosch's bat breakingImage Credit source: Screenshot

The South African cricket team has a long history of losing matches in strange fashion. Sometimes the team has lost the match due to rain, and sometimes the team has lost the match due to wrong calculation of Duckworth-Lewis rule. Who can forget the semi-final of the World Cup 1999, where the match was tied due to run out in the last over and then the team missed reaching the final. Another match has been added to the long list of these dramatic defeats, where a broken bat caused South Africa's loss.

Bat broken, run missed and loss incurred

Chasing the target of 125 runs set by West Indies, South Africa needed 16 runs in the last over. Only 7 runs were scored in the first 4 balls and 1 wicket had fallen. In such a situation, 9 runs were needed in the last 2 balls and this is where the drama happened. Corbin Bosch hit a strong shot on the fifth ball of the over, on which the fielder dropped an easy catch. Bosch did not get the boundary but he was saved from being out.

Now what happened was that as long as the ball was in the air, Bosch had completed 2 runs. But this is where he made a mistake. In fact, he started running with the handle of the broken bat in one hand and the rest of it in the other hand. But as soon as he tried to fix the broken part on the crease during the first run, he failed and immediately turned back for the second run. Replays showed that his bat was not inside the crease while completing the first run and hence it was declared a short run. That means South Africa got only one run instead of 2.

The match could have gone into a super over

Now South Africa needed 8 runs on the last ball and Corbin Bosch could score only one run. South Africa lost this match by 6 runs. Now if the bat had not been broken then Bosch and South Africa would have got 2 runs. In such a situation, South Africa could have tied the match by hitting a six on the last ball, which would have taken the match into a super over and could have created a chance for them to win. But this could not happen and the breakage of the bat also played an important role in this.

Earlier, this T20 series match was played between South Africa and West Indies on Saturday 31 January in Johannesburg, which was affected by rain. In this match, West Indies batted first but it rained after only 6 overs and due to this the match had to be reduced to 10 overs and West Indies scored 114 runs. According to the Duckworth-Lewis rule, South Africa was given a target of 125 runs to win but the team could reach only 118 runs.