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Proteas submerge Kenya

South Africa wrapped up their fourth league match against minnows Kenya by seven wickets with nine overs to spare. With this win, South Africa becomes the first team to enter the Super Six league.

Playing in the picturesque VRA ground in Amstelveen, Holland, Kenya, put into bat by Hansie Cronje, got off to a wonderful start, giving the Proteas something to think about. Openers Kennedy Otieno and Ravindu Shah played some delightful strokes on either side of the wicket and made the much-hyped South African attack look pedestrian. They were especially severe on Allan Donald who was pulled to the mid-wicket fence on a couple of occasions, inviting the famous glare from the 'white lightning'.

At 66/1 after 15 overs, Kenya looked set for a fighting total before the South Africans lifted their game several notches to remind Kenya of their status as the minnows of world cricket.

Steve Elworthy trapped Otieno in front as the keeper-opener shuffled across his stumps. And that triggered a collapse as the Kenyan batsmen seemed to be competing with one another to see who returned fastest to the pavilion. Only opener Shah held his own against the Protean attack and scored a defiant, entertaining 50 off 62 balls.

From 80 for 1 in 15 overs, six wickets fell for the addition of only 27 runs as 'Zulu' Lance Klusener ran through the side until skipper Aasif Karim held the lower order together, scoring 22 runs.

After having proved his worth with the bat against India and Sri Lanka, Klusener showed how valuable he can be with the ball as well as he scalped five wickets for 21 runs off 8.3 overs.

As a result, Kenya failed to even bat out their full 50 overs, the team being dismissed in 44.3 overs.

The South African reply was pretty aggressive as the opening pair of Gary Kirsten and Herschelle Gibbs reached 55 runs in 10 overs before Gibbs found himself blocking the way of the cherry to be declared leg before to Thomas Odoyo for 38.

The proceedings slowed considerably after wicket-keeper Mark Boucher was dismissed soon after, caught by Mohammad Sheikh off Joseph Angara.

Kirsten tried to run into some sort of form, but didn't quite succeed as he only managed to score 27 runs off 71 deliveries before being castled by Maurice Odumbe.

Jacques Kallis (44 not out) and Daryll Cullinan (35 not out) then took South Africa to the target without further ado, but their performance was far from convincing.

After India's resounding win over Kenya, some 'experts' had sniggered that the tall score was achieved against a sub-standard attack. Today, that same attack forced South Africa to struggle to a mediocre 153 off 41 overs!

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