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India registered a historic win on Day 5 of the Boxing Day Test defeating South Africa by 113 runs to claim their first-ever triumph at SuperSport Park in Centurion. Opener KL Rahul was named ‘Player of the Match’ for his magnificent hundred in the first innings.
Seamer Mohammad Shami also played a huge role behind Team India’s scintillating victory. The right-armer ended the match with eight wickets, including his five-wicket haul in the first innings. No wonder captain Virat Kohli was largely impressed with Shami for his tremendous performance with the red cherry.
During the post-match presentation, Kohli heaped praises on Shami, naming him among the top-three seamers in the world. Kohli reckoned Shami makes the most out of any track and bowls on areas where batters cant leave the ball. The Indian captain also expressed his joy for Shami reaching the 200-wicket benchmark in the match.
“Absolutely world-class talent. For me, he is easily among the best three seamers in the world right now. Just the way he bowls on pitches which don’t seem to do often like the others, he gets the extra bit from every pitch purely because of his strong wrists, his seam position and ability to hit the lengths consistently,” Kohli said after the match.
“(He bowls on) areas where you can’t leave the ball, and that’s absolutely his biggest quality. Very happy for him to get 200 wickets and again an impactful performance,” he added.
Kohli also mentioned that India would have got a bigger first-innings lead had speedster Jasprit Bumrah bowled more in the first innings. Notably, Bumrah had suffered an ankle strain after landing awkwardly while bowling on Day 3.
“We just spoke about it in the change room – the fact he didn’t bowl much in the first innings, it allowed the opposition to get around 40 extra runs. Just the way these guys bowl together has been a hallmark of our team getting a result in difficult situations,” Kohli added further.
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