South Africa thump England by 7 wickets

Jacques Kallis flays past point during his 57, England v South Africa, ICC World Twenty20, Trent Bridge, June 11

NOTTINGHAM: Jacques Kallis cracked his maiden T20 International half century as he led a clinical South Africa to a thumping seven-wicket victory over England in their opening Super Eight match of the ICC Twenty20 World Cup here.

Kallis top-scored with an unbeaten 49-ball 57 in South Africa's run chase of 112 in the Group E Super Eight encounter to help the Proteas reach the target in 18.2 overs and help maintain his side's unbeaten run in the tournament so far.

Earlier, South Africa produced a clinical bowling and fielding performance to skittle England to a paltry 111 after the home team captain Paul Collingwood elected to bat.
The other opener Kallis and one-down Herschelle Gibbs steadied the run chase and the duo shared a 68-ball 74 stand for the second wicket to take South Africa on the threshold of victory. Gibbs was out for a run-a-ball 30, falling to Graeme Swann in the 16th over after hitting a six off the same bowler. But that was too late too little for England.

With just 19 needing from the last five overs, it was an easy task for South Africa though they lost in-form AB de Villiers for 11 off Adil Rashid.

Kallis, who hit five fours and a six and needed 46 balls for his fifty, hit the winning runs, a four, to take South Africa to 114 for three.

Broad (1/14), Rashid (1/24) and Swann (1/26) were the successful England bowlers.

Earlier, home team captain Paul Collingwood's decision to bat on a good batting pitch at Trent Bridge boomeranged with none of his batsmen except for Owais Shah, who top-scored with 38, giving a fight to the Proteas who bowled a tight line and length.

Besides Shah, only two other batsmen, Kevin Pietersen (19) and Collingwood (19) managed to score runs in double digits as the home team slumped to their lowest Twenty20 International score.

Openers Ravi Bopara (2) and Luke Wright (1) were hastily back inside the hut by the second over at team total of four. Key batsman Kevin Pietersen looked like to steady the rocking ship with back-to-back boundaries off Steyn and Jacques Kallis each. He, however, fell in the sixth over to a brilliant piece of fielding by Roelof van der Merwe who dived full length to hold the catch after Pietersen had played an Albie Morkel low full toss.

England struggled to find the runs and they were 47 for three after the half-way mark. But the worse was to come later as their seven batsmen were out for just 33 runs.

Owais Shah briefly dominated Proteas' bowlers with a six and two fours off the 12th over bowled by van der Merwe from which England took 17 runs.

But, just as the their innings seemed to be picking up the steam, England lost wickets in a heap with three batsmen out in nine balls and the home team were 83 for six from 73 for three.

Collingwood completely missed the line of a Kaliis delivery while trying for a big heave only to see his stumps uprooted. James Foster (1) holed out to Morkel while trying a reverse sweep and Dimitri Mascarenhas (1) failed to keep his off stump intact off van der Merwe.

Swann (5), Broad (9) and James Anderson (0) could not do much as England ended their innings at Nelson's total.

For South Africa, Parnell took three for 14 from 3.5 overs while Kallis and van der Merwe contributed two wickets each by conceding 20 and 32 runs respectively.