Ken Borland

Leaders Ryan Fox and Luke Donald were only able to complete three holes on the second day of the Nedbank Golf Challenge at Sun City on Friday as thundershowers and persistent rain washed out play, leaving tournament organisers under pressure to finish the second and third rounds on Saturday.

Overnight leader Fox birdied the par-five second hole, but then immediately gave the stroke back with a bogey-five on the third to sit at eight-under-par when play was suspended at 11.49am due to lightning. Steady rain had already been falling for some time and it never relented, leading to the course being waterlogged.

Donald had joined Fox on eight-under as he birdied the second hole and parred the first and third holes.

“We would need two hours of no rain just to start to get the course reasonably playable,” tournament director David Williams told media after play was called off for the day at 3.30pm.

“If we could have got a couple more hours in today then that would have been great, but we felt it was better to make a decision. We will start again at 7.45am on Saturday and the third round will be played in the same groups.

“The golfers will get a half-an-hour break after the second round and then go again. That way we can save two hours, maybe more, with the forecast not being marvellous for Saturday either.

“Sunday morning is also not so good, so we need to get as much completed on Saturday as we can. Hopefully we get the third round done, but there’s a lot in the air at the moment,” Williams said.

Perhaps the golfer most frustrated by the delay was Englishman Ross Fisher, who had a great round going and had climbed into a tie for third place on six-under-par with Rasmus Hojgaard and Guido Migliozzi.

Fisher birdied the first two holes and then the ninth, and had just eagled the par-five 10^th when the golfers were pulled off the course. Being five-under through 10 holes has lifted the five-time DP World Tour winner to just two strokes off the lead.

Hojgaard was also going well on three-under through six holes.

Veteran Richard Sterne is the leading South African, birdieing the first two holes to go to three-under.

The chance of rain scuppering the Proteas’ chances is apparently just 2% and South Africa will be obvious favourites when they take on the Netherlands in Adelaide in the early hours of Sunday morning with a semifinal place on the line.

It’s the simplest of equations for the Proteas – beat the qualifiers and they are in the semi-finals. A defeat or a washed-out match would mean the winners of the game between Pakistan and Bangladesh would go through. Zimbabwe will also still have a chance of progressing if they beat India, but for that to happen and the Dutch to triumph over the Proteas would be two of the biggest upsets in T20 World Cup history on the same day.

Although captain Temba Bavuma said he was not concerned by the performance of the team in their loss to Pakistan in their previous match, the sloppiness of their display is clearly something they cannot afford to repeat. Especially not when they are on the verge of reaching the knockout rounds.

What was frustrating about their showing was that they did everything right for the first 10 overs, knocking over the Pakistan top-order. But their failure to bowl the right lengths in the closing overs was once again the burr in their saddle, Iftikhar Ahmed and Shadab Khan lashing quickfire half-centuries as 106 runs were thrashed in the last eight overs.

It was a cold, wet night in Sydney but that did not excuse a messy fielding display, with catches being dropped and straightforward outfielding being duffed.

In terms of the batting, Quinton de Kock and Rilee Rossouw both failed, but Bavuma and Aiden Markram did well enough to have the Proteas on track after the powerplay. But both of them losing their wickets in the same over, shortly before the rain delay, meant the revised DLS target was too stiff for Heinrich Klaasen and Tristan Stubbs.

The Proteas will be hoping the talismanic David Miller has recovered from his back spasm, and they know that winning their next three games will make this event their most memorable world cup campaign ever.

“You can’t afford to give teams momentum and I’m not going to look for excuses for our fielding display,” Bavuma said after the Pakistan loss. “We have been very good up to that game and we have fielded in the wet before.

“But mistakes were made and that was not the type of display you want at this level, especially in this part of the tournament. Maybe the intensity was down a bit, but it was definitely not the standard we pride ourselves on.

“Hopefully we play our best cricket in the next three games, the next one is a must-win and then we have the playoffs,” Bavuma said.

South Africa’s misfortune at cricket world cups is well known and the nation’s cursed luck struck again in their opening T20 World Cup match in Hobart this week when they were forced to share the points with Zimbabwe after rain washed out play with the Proteas needing just 13 runs in four overs to win.

Here are three other times rain has impeded South Africa at cricket world cups –

March 22, 1992 in Sydney

South Africa was heading towards democracy and euphoria was gripping the nation as the team marched into the semi-finals of their first World Cup. But the nation’s hopes were dashed as, chasing 253 to win in 45 overs, South Africa reached 231/6 off 42.5 overs when rain arrived.

Brian McMillan and Dave Richardson had already added 25, but when play resumed, the weird rules for adjusted targets (the team batting first had their lowest-scoring overs taken off the total), and the TV cut-off time meant South Africa needed 21 runs off the last ball, their adjusted target being 252 in 43 overs.

Many believe this is when South Africa’s World Cup curse began.

March 3, 2003 in Durban

There were high hopes for South Africa as the 2003 World Cup was held there following their exit in 1999 in an epic semi-final tie with Australia. But this time they failed to progress out of the group stages, ironically again due to a tie in what would be their last match. There was rain around Kingsmead as they chased 269 to beat Sri Lanka and, with Mark Boucher and captain Shaun Pollock at the crease in the closing stages, the sheets for the Duckworth/Lewis targets were brought out to them and also Lance Klusener when Pollock was run out. But what nobody realised was the number printed on the paper was the par score, so South Africa needed one more run to win. Boucher, thinking they had done enough to win, blocked what would turn out to be the last ball as the heavens opened. Why nobody realised the mistake and who was to blame – Pollock, Boucher, coach Eric Simons or the manager? – were questions that tortured local fans for weeks.

March 24, 2015 in Auckland

Faf du Plessis and AB de Villiers were going great guns in the World Cup semi-final against New Zealand, having added 102 for the fourth wicket in less than 12 overs and with 12 overs remaining to add to their total of 216/3. And then the rain came.

Du Plessis gloved a hook down the leg-side off the second ball back and vital momentum was lost with the Proteas finishing on 281/5 in 43 overs.

Duckworth/Lewis credited them with some extra runs though and New Zealand were set 298 to win in 43 overs. It is only befitting of a World Cup curse that it was a South African born player, Grant Elliott, who lashed 84 not out off 73 balls to eliminate his former compatriots. What could have been if there had been no rain delay?

Quinton de Kock put on the most grand display of boundary hitting, but not even his brilliance could beat the rain as South Africa’s opening T20 World Cup match against Zimbabwe ended in No Result at the Bellerive Oval in Hobart on Monday.

The rain was always going to be a threat in Tasmania, with the start of play delayed by more than two-and-a-half hours after Zimbabwe had won the toss and elected to bat first.

The match was reduced to nine overs a side and Zimbabwe posted 79/5.

Thanks to De Kock blazing Tendai Chatara’s first five balls for 4-4-4-6-4, South Africa made a rollicking start. Rain then forced the players from the field, but fortunately only two overs were lost and the Proteas were set a revised target of 64 in seven overs.

De Kock was unstoppable, plundering 47 not out off 18 balls, with eight fours and a six, as South Africa reached 51/0 after three overs.

But the umpires then, like concerned parents looking after their children, decided to take the players off the field. Having tried their utmost to get a game in, one could sympathise with their decision because the Zimbabwe players were slipping all over the place in the steady drizzle and bowler Richard Ngarava had already left the field after slipping and probably twisting his ankle.

Zimbabwe had manfully got on with the job, but to be fair to all the teams, the umpires had little choice but to go off the field.

Zimbabwe had begun their innings in pell-mell fashion, and very quickly found themselves 19/4, as Wayne Parnell bowled well up front and Lungi Ngidi effected a double strike in the third over, removing Regis Chakabva (8) and Sikandar Raza (0).

There was also a run out amidst the chaotic start, David Miller scoring a fine direct hit from cover to remove the experienced Sean Williams (1).

For Zimbabwe to have any chance, someone had to show more composure and Wessley Madhevere proved the man for the occasion. Dropped on 11 by Ngidi off Keshav Maharaj, he provided a late boost as he belted 35 not out off just 18 deliveries.

Parnell was the pick of the bowlers, with brilliant figures of 1/6 in two overs, while Anrich Nortje (1/10 in 2 overs) bowled very well at the death.

There was a little bit of pain though for Kagiso Rabada and Ngidi, as they went for 20 runs in their two overs.