Botha hails Boucher and Morkel

Albie Morkel goes aerial during his 37 from 19 balls which made victory possible

Johan Botha was full of praise for Mark Boucher and Albie Morkel after they helped South Africa snatch an unlikely four-wicket victory over Australia in the opening Twenty20 international at the Wanderers.

Chasing 166, the Proteas looked well out of the game at 83 for five with just under eight overs remaining, before the pair put on 58 in five pulsating overs to edge the hosts closer to victory.

Morkel was eventually out for 37 off just 19 balls with the score on 141, but Boucher finished unbeaten on 36 to hand his side a 1-0 lead in the two-match series.

Speaking afterwards, the captain lauded his wicketkeeper, who has come under intense pressure in recent months following his lack of contribution with the bat.

But Botha said: “He’s done it many times before and he just showed us again tonight that he’s probably our best finisher with Albie.

“He deserves his place in the team and has a lot of input off the field as well which makes him very valuable.”

Reflecting on Morkel’s performance, he continued: “I think he showed us all summer how good he can be.

“With 62 off 30, a lot of teams will think they’re out of it, but with our two guys that were still in, we knew we were still in it.

“They showed that at the end and Albie’s bowling too is important. He’s a world-class all-rounder.”

Botha admitted that the victory, only their second in a total of five Twenty20 internationals against Australian, was very pleasing.

“It was a really good win tonight,” he added. “It got a bit tight, but with those two out there we had hope.

Brett Geeves bowls AB de Villiers but his overs cost 35

“That’s what they get paid for, the big bucks, because they do it under pressure and they did it again tonight. But with those two in and with a long way to go, we knew we still had a chance.”

Australia captain Ricky Ponting was happy with the overall performance, but not as pleased with the result.

He said: “I’m disappointed to lose the game, because we certainly got ourselves into a position in which we probably should have won.

“That’s what’s the disappointing thing about it. If we hadn’t gotten ourselves into that position then I wouldn’t have been too disappointed.

“You want to win every game you play and we wanted to win tonight. We’ve trained well the last couple of days.

“We were a long way off our best cricket tonight, but the satisfying thing is that we had a very good chance to win the game.”

Australia had several unfamiliar names in their team, including Shane Harwood and Brett Geeves - who conceded 83 runs between them in 7.2 overs - and Ponting is hoping they can learn from the experience.

He added: “Geeves and Harwood playing tonight, a couple of guys that have been the best performers in domestic cricket back in Australia, they deserved the opportunity to play.

“Both would have learned a lot from the experience, they’re bowling to good players on good wickets.

“It just goes to show in this game you’ve got to execute everything, almost perfectly as a bowler or you’re going to go around the park.

“So, they’ll learn a lot from that and the more games we can get into the younger guys, it’s a chance for them to learn and for us it’s a chance to learn more about them and the better off we’ll obviously be.”