CWC 2023: “Happy to play that role tonight,” says Dussen following his 76-run knock against Afghanistan

Ahmedabad (Gujarat) [India]: Following South Africa’s five-wicket win against Afghanistan in the 42nd match of the ODI World Cup 2023 at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on Friday, Proteas batter Rassie van der Dussen said that he is happy to play the role tonight.

Speaking at the post-match presentation, Dussen said that they were happy with bowling first and that they would have chased anyway.

Dussen also praised Quinton de Kock and Temba Bavuma and said that they played a stellar knock and made a solid platform for the middle order.

He added that the Proteas have learned a lot from their previous two encounters at the ongoing ODI World Cup.

“We were happy with bowling first; we would have chased anyway. We knew they were a quality bowling attack, and we wanted to put ourselves in a difficult situation. There are one or two things we can tweak but happy with how the run-chase went.

In any case, there has to be someone who plays the anchor role. We had a lovely platform with Quinny and Temba giving us a solid platform and that made it easy for me. Happy to play that role tonight and we have some good partnerships in the middle, happy to get across the finish line.

It’s funny when you do something so well and the other part is not so good, people say you are doing that badly. We were on the 50-50 mark in terms of chasing so we wanted to put ourselves in a difficult situation and test ourselves going forward. Going into the semi-final, this is what we wanted to do and it worked out well.

We have taken a lot of learning from the last two games. Kolkata was a lot drier and a lot lower. We know what to expect going into the semi-final. Hopefully, if we get back here again, we’ll put in a similar performance,” Dussen said.

In the match, South Africa managed to restrict Afghanistan to a total of 244. While chasing the target, the Proteas stumbled a couple of times, putting themselves in a tough spot, but Dussen’s unbeaten knock ensured that they emerged victorious.