Tournament favourites South Africa lived up to their expectations in the World Twenty20, beating Scotland by a mammoth 130-run margin in a Group D match at the Oval on Sunday.

Put into bat first, South Africa posted a huge 211 for five in 20 overs with AB de Villiers hitting a whirlwind unbeaten 79 off just 34 balls and Jacques Kallis scoring 48.

South African bowlers packed up Scotland for just 81 in only 15.4 overs. The total was marginally better than the lowest score of 73 recorded by Kenya against New Zealand at the World Championship two years ago in Durban.

South Africa’s total, which was their highest in Twenty20, was set after some stunning display by de Villiers and Albie Morkel (24) in the last few overs after skipper Graeme Smith (38) and Kallis gave them a solid start.

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South Africa will play Scotland in the fifth game of the ICC World T20 at Oval in London on Sunday. Scotland has already lost one game to New Zealand in a high-scoring seven-over glut, whereas, this will be South Africa’s first game.

South Africa goes into the tournament as one of the favourites, and they should protect the team against sluggishness that could set in considering Scotland as a weak opposition. Their batsmen have had a decent couple of warm-up outings, after half their side had represented a franchise or the other during the Indian Premier League.

Despite Graeme Smith’s lack of form during the IPL, he is a favourite. The experiment with Jacques Kallis at the top of the order with Herschelle Gibbs coming in at number three should continue in this game as well.

We can also expect AB de Villiers to top the run scoring chart as he possesses a nice balance of attack and defence which was seen in the recently concluded IPL.

Teams:

Scotland: GM Hamilton(c), RD Berrington, KJ Coetzer, GD Drummond, RM Haq, NFI McCallum, CS MacLeod, JD Nel, NS Poonia, GA Rogers, CJO Smith(wk), JH Stander, RR Watson, DF Watts, CM Wright

South Africa: GC Smith(c), J Botha, YA Abdulla, MV Boucher(wk), AB de Villiers, JP Duminy, HH Gibbs, JH Kallis, JA Morkel, M Morkel, JL Ontong, WD Parnell, RJ Peterson, DW Steyn, RE van der Merwe

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