The Wanderers is the venue for the third and final One Day International between South Africa and Pakistan, the game takes place on Sunday and Pakistan are bidding for a clean sweep of the series.
Pakistan drew first blood in this 3 match ODI series with a thrilling 3 wicket win at Paarl on Tuesday (chasing down the Proteas 239/9 with 3 balls to spare) and they followed up with an 81 run win at Newlands on Thursday.
The Proteas won the toss and opted to bowl at Newlands on Tuesday and the decision backfired as Pakistan piled on 329 all out in 49.5 overs. Rizwan top scored with 80, Babar Azam made 73 and Kamran Ghulam hit 63 including 5 of his sides 12 maximums. Kwena Maphaka picked up 4 wickets and Marco Jansen took 3.
Most of the Proteas top order got starts but only Klaasen, batting at No 5 made anything substantial, He went on to top score with 97 but 4 late wickets for Shaheen Afridi saw the lower order collapse and aside from Klaasen's display the chase finished tamely on 248 all out in 43.1 overs.
After this the first of 2 test matches starts at Centurion on Boxing Day.
This was how the teams lined up at Newlands in the second ODI
South Africa: Tony de Zorzi, Temba Bavuma (c), Rassie van der Dussen, Aiden Markram, Heinrich Klaasen (wk), David Miller, Marco Jansen, Andile Phehlukwayo, Bjorn Fortuin, Kwena Maphaka, Tabraiz Shamsi
Pakistan: Saim Ayub, Abdullah Shafique, Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan (c & wk), Kamran Ghulam, Salman Agha, Irfan Khan, Shaheen Afridi, Naseem Shah, Haris Rauf, Abrar Ahmed
South Africa Recent Form
In October the Proteas beat Ireland 2-1 in a series staged in the UAE. That came on a the back of a 2-1 defeat to Afghanistan in Sharjah a month earlier. Last December India came to SA and beat the Proteas 2-1.
Pakistan Recent Form
Pakistan's only ODI action in 2024 came last month. They recovered from losing the opening match of a 3 game series in Zimbabwe to win 2-1. It was the same story in Australia when they lost the first match by 2 wickets but bounced back with wide margin wins (9 wickets and 8 wickets) to claim the series 2-1.
Head to Head
Overall the teams have met 85 times in this format with South Africa winning 52 to Pakistan's 32 and there has been 1 no result
The Venue, The Wanderers, Johannesburg
The Proteas have played 13 ODI's at this venue over the course of the last decade, winning 10 and losing 3
The most recent ODI here came back in December 2023 and South Africa (116) lost to India (117/2) by 8 wickets.
For the weather forecast click here
The Betting
At the time of writing South Africa are 13/20 to win with BetXchange and Pakistan can be backed at 13/10
South Africa are 6/10 to hit the most sixes, Pakistan are 33/20 and a tie is 15/2
Prices subject to change
The Verdict
We were in the winners box with Saim Ayub as top Pakistan run scorer in the series opener and Shaheen Afridi to be the top bowler in the second match and the betting markets have underestimated this talented Pakistan ODI side.
I wouldn't be overly surprised if South Africa get a consolation win but I certainly wouldn't be backing them at odds on. I'm in sixes mode with 14 or more in total and a highest scoring over of 18 or more looks very possible.
Bet: Total In The Highest Scoring Over, over 17.5 at 8/10 with BetXchange
Total match sixes, over 13.5 at 9/10 with BetXchange
Prices subject to change
