Heinrich Klaasen surprised by Kohli’s decision of not bowling Bhuvi and Bumrah

The Indian wrist spinners have caught the imagination of the cricketing world, spinning a web around the South African batsmen with their trickery and guile.

The South African batsmen have been very tentative this series, letting the Indian spinners dominate them all through.

Neither have they been able to pick them nor have they been able to put them off their game plan.

Chahal and Kuldeep have settled into their own in this series, bowling with so much confidence and ripping apart the South African batting line up in the first 3 ODI’s.

But yesterday was different. AB de Villiers had donned the pink jersey and he was ready to take the attack to the Indian spinners. And attack he did.

Yuzvendra Chahal was taken for a ride by ABD, and later, Miller tonked him to all parts of the ground, after having bowled a no-ball to dismiss Miller.

Klassen and Miller’s middle-order partnership took the Proteas through, coming up with some really innovative and quality shot making to give the Indian wrist spinners a reality check.

Klassen, the South Africa wicketkeeper, who was adjudged ‘man of the match’, thought that Virat Kohli missed a trick last night, by not going back to his fast bowlers, when both the wrist spinners were being taken for a ride.

“I was very surprised. David (Miller) and I thought they would have kept them (the pacers) at back for two overs each. But I think how this series went that led them to bowl their spinners for the remaining of the overs. But I was very surprised about it.” Klassen said.

Klassen opened up about South Africa’s worries against the wrist spin, saying that all of them found it difficult to pick the ‘chinaman’.

“I wouldn’t say (we have solved the spin riddle). The problem at beginning of series was that we didn’t pick the chinaman (Yadav). That obviously makes the difference not to be able to score against him,” said Klassen.

“No one really struggled to pick Chahal but he seemed to pick up a lot of the wickets. We struggled to pick up the chinaman’s variations. But we did a lot of homework on him over the last 2-3 days and that seemed to work today.” he added.

Klassen was very happy with the performance of the Proteas in the Pink ODI and feels that this might be the momentum swing that the hosts were looking for.

“This is a massive confidence booster for us. We didn’t have the confidence earlier, but it has lifted our spirits. It has given belief in the dressing room,” he said.

“It is also nice to have AB de Villiers back again. The environment changes when he comes back. He is a huge influence in the change room,” he concluded.