De Kock expects South Africa to learn from Oval experience
- Wicket-keeper top-scored in opening defeat to England
- Proteas return to The Oval for second game against Bangladesh on Sunday
Experience is everything at a World Cup and Quinton de Kock insists South Africa will only get better when they return to The Oval against Bangladesh on Sunday.
The Proteas suffered in Thursday’s ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup opener, going down by 104 runs to hosts England on a pitch they struggled to fathom.
Having won the toss, South Africa elected to bowl and restricted England’s powerful batsman to 311-8 – with leg-spinner Imran Tahir striking in the very first over.
But England extracted more pace and bounce with the ball, dismissing South Africa for just 207 in reply.
Now the Proteas face a hungry Bangladesh – playing their first game of the tournament – and De Kock is confident knowledge will mean power on The Oval’s surface.
“We know what is happening with the wicket now, so we should improve,” he said.
“But, saying that, we are against Bangladesh and we know how well they can play. They are a good team also. We will go back and assess from there.
“This is just the beginning. It is not how you start a tournament, it is how you finish it. We started a long time ago.
“We will go back to the drawing board and talk about what we can do better and what we did well.
“England had us under the pump from the start with bowling and batting. They are a good team. Now we must get ready and get back for Bangladesh.”
De Kock top-scored for South Africa, his 74-ball 68 the highlight of their innings.
However, they were on the back foot from the off, with England’s express paceman Jofra Archer hitting De Kock’s opening partner Hashim Amla on the head with a sharp delivery, forcing him to retire.
Amla later returned but South Africa lost regular wickets, with only De Kock and Rassie van der Dussen (50) offering any resistance.
“When Hash retired, it is almost like losing a wicket even though he was not out. That was tough and then we lost Aiden [Markram] quite early,” he said.
“We knew it would be tough for us and then Faf [Du Plessis] also went early. Jofra bowled outstandingly, with good wheels and then at the other end Chris Woakes hit a good length.
“He [Archer] is the type of guy who is always looking to get wickets up front so we were trying to nullify that. Rassie and I were trying to bat through it, we were not worried about the score – we knew we could catch up.
“It is a good wicket and the outfield is fast. We wanted to see how far we can go. We lost wickets at the wrong time and that did not help us.
“We had a good partnership but we just kept losing wickets.”