Amla century helps South Africa win ODI opener

PRETORIA, South Africa (Reuters) – A century from Hashim Amla laid the foundation for home success yesterday, as South Africa beat New Zealand by 20 runs to win their opening one-day international at Centurion.Amla displayed the form that had him rated the world’s best batsman as he mastered the bowling on a slow track and scored 124 for South Africa to open with 304 for seven off their 50 overs.
New Zealand kept up with the required run rate for most of their chase but lost wickets at key intervals and were bowled out for 284 in the 49th over of the first of a three-match series.
Amla scored his 21st ODI century off 126 balls and featured in a 185-run partnership for the second wicket with Rilee Rossouw, who tempered his usual aggressive style to build a steady innings before being bowled in the 42nd over for 89.
It proved a positive start after New Zealand had won the toss and sent the hosts in to bat.
But a chance of a much bigger score, on the same pitch where they lost to New Zealand in a Twenty20 international on Sunday, disappeared as South Africa lost five wickets in their last eight overs.
South Africa made an immediate breakthrough on the New Zealand batting as Dale Steyn had Luke Ronchi caught behind at the end of the first over after seeing two earlier deliveries dropped.
New Zealand then set about chasing down the target with Tom Latham and captain Kane Williamson amassing 104 runs for the second wicket before a vital breakthrough, as Williamson was caught at extra cover for 47 off spinner Imran Tahir.
Latham (60) was the fifth wicket to fall halfway to the target as he walked across his stumps to a straight ball and was dismissed leg-before.
But the Kiwis kept up the pressure with fighting contributions from James Neesham (41) and Colin Munro (33), who might have been able to take their team past the target had they been more patient.
The second ODI is in Potchefstroom on Sunday.

Great knock by Amla who is one of the few remaining batsmen that is great in both test and odi cricket and not too shabby in t20 either. I knew it would have been a close game but expected South Africa to come out on top.

Kudos to Amla,but honestly Neesham's wicket was the turning point.He was looking to hit the pedal harder and aim at finishing it off after settling in,but unfortunate that he had to lose his wicket.
They had the game in hand for major chunk of the innings

There are plenty of batsman that are still great in both Test and ODI cricket. The following batsman have an average of 39+ in both formats of the game over the last three years: AB de Villiers, Sangakkara, Ross Taylor, Steve Smith, Williamson, Azhar Ali, Kohli, Voges, Dhawan, Mathews, Misbah-ul-Haq, Mushfiqur, Root, du Plessis and Clarke. Those are just off the top of my head and all of them are pretty decent t20 players, too. If you narrow that range just to the last 12 months, the list would also include Samuels, Warner, Tamim Iqbal, Rahane and Hafeez, too.

As to the series itself, given that South Africa are at home and New Zealand are without their two front-line seamers (and McCullum too), South Africa will be expected to win this series. Both teams have done a good job of using their squad depth in the last few weeks of ODI matches.

From a South African perspective this game was far too close for comfort. Our catching was really poor, with debutant David Wiese having a particularly bad day. I hope that the Proteas can raise the standard for the remaining matches of the series.