India Vs South Africa 1st T20i PtiImage Credit source: PTI

The Indian team continued the success of the ODI format in the T20 series as well and defeated South Africa in the very first match. In the first match of the ODI series played at Barabati Stadium in Cuttack, Team India, captained by Suryakumar Yadav, defeated South Africa by a huge margin of 101 runs. Star all-rounder Hardik Pandya, who was out for two months due to injury, made a comeback with a bang and scored a quick half-century to take Team India to 175 runs. After this, with the mixed efforts of the bowlers, India bowled out South Africa for just 74 runs.

Batting first after losing the toss, Team India scored 175 runs but it was not easy for them to reach here because the top order batsmen failed to score runs openly. Shubman Gill, who returned to the team, collapsed in the first over itself, while captain Suryakumar Yadav and Abhishek Sharma also could not last long. Team India had lost 4 wickets for only 78 runs and the situation was becoming difficult.

But Hardik Pandya attacked as soon as he entered the crease and then Team India's score gradually started gaining momentum.

Like India, South Africa also had a bad start and in the very first over, Arshdeep Singh made Quinton de Kock his victim, while Tristan Stubbs also soon became Arshdeep's victim. Aiden Markram and Dewald Brewis hit some big shots but as soon as Axar Patel bowled South African captain Markram, wickets gradually started falling.

Arshdeep, Bumrah, Akshar and Varun Chakraborty took 2 wickets each for Team India. The African team was all out in just 12.3 overs. This is also South Africa's smallest score in T20 International. Before this, his lowest score was 87 runs and that too came against India in 2022. At the same time, the South African team, which won 2 consecutive T20 matches on the Cuttack ground, could not even complete its hat-trick.