England vs South Africa 2017: 5 players who disappointed for South Africa in the Test series
England completed a clean sweep of series wins as they defeated South Arica 3-1 in the Test series after clinching the ODI and T20 series 2-1. In the final Test, Jonny Bairstow’s 99, assisted by Joe Root’s 52 and Ben Stokes’s 58 helped England to 362 in the first innings. In reply, South Africa could pile up only 226, thanks to James Anderson and Stuart Broad who picked up four and three wickets respectively.
In the second innings, Morne Morkel’s four-wicket spell and Duanne Olivier’s three-wicket spell restricted England to only 243, thus giving South Africa a target of 380 to chase in order to level the Test series.
After losing both openers and Temba Bavuma early, Hashim Amla and skipper Faf du Plessis added 123 runs for the fourth wicket before the former was dismissed for a well-made 83. Amla’s dismissal was the turning point of the match as wickets kept tumbling down for the visitors courtesy of Moeen Ali who went on to take 5 wickets.
South Africa lost their final six wickets for only 39 runs and were dismissed for 202, thus giving England a 177-run win and the series.
South Africa’s performances have been quite underwhelming during the series and there were quite a few players who disappointed.
#5. Chris Morris
The all-rounder was chosen to play in the second Test at Trent Bridge as the replacement for Theunis de Bruyn who disappointed in the first Test at Lord’s. He came in to bat at No.8 during both innings and scored 36 in the first innings which was followed by only 13 in the second innings.
However, he was decent with the ball, picking up five wickets throughout the match.
Morris played the third Test at the Oval but his performance was quite underwhelming. The 30-year old was very expensive with the ball, going for 91 runs from his 17 overs in the first innings, followed by a wicket-taking but a more expensive spell of 2/70 from 11 overs in the second innings.
Morris’s performance with the bat was poor as he scored only two in the first innings and piled up just 24 in the second. Morris was not selected to play in the fourth Test as De Bruyn got his place back.