Two days after Sachin Tendulkar made history in Gwalior, South African batsman AB de Villiers said it was an “unbelievable” batting display and no bowler in the world could have stopped the iconic Indian on Wednesday.
Tendulkar became the first batsman in one day cricket’s history to smash a double century in the match and his sublime unbeaten 200 off just 147 balls guided India to a series-clinching 153-run victory.
De Villiers, whose unbeaten 114 in the Gwalior match was reduced to a footnote, said Tendulkar was simply unstoppable.
“Sachin played an unbelievable knock...He didn’t do much wrong in the last game, I don’t think any bowler in the world could have tackled that,” said de Villiers.
Over all, de Villiers said, bowling to Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag was a learning experience for the South African bowlers.
“When you are up against the likes of Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag, it puts a lot of pressure on you early on. The bowlers are quite young, so it is pretty tough for them coming out here and bowling to some of the best players in the world.
“I think the most important thing for our young bowlers is to learn and I think they did that. We had a nice team meeting and we discussed the game plan, where we went wrong and what we did right,” he said.
“It’s not really a dead game for us. We have got a lot of pride to win back. We really want to win the last One-day international. 2-1 sounds a lot better than 3-0. We really want to fight and prove a point that we are a good side,” said de Villiers.
He said there was nothing wrong with South Africa and it was actually India who had raised their game to clinch the ODI series with one match to spare.
“Not much went wrong. We still tried our best. Everyone is still in good form. I just think the Indians raised the bar and are playing better cricket. We are lacking in a few areas,” conceded the 26-year-old batsman.
De Villiers felt the younger players in his team had learnt a lot on the visit which should stand them in good stead for the 2011 World Cup.
“Obviously, it has been a great experience for a bunch of young guys. The youngsters have learnt a lot of lessons over here, including myself, I have learnt quite a bit,” de Villiers said.
“The one-day series is a bit of a disappointment but as long as we learn from our mistakes, I cannot see us going wrong in the future. We got a few very talented young boys in the team and if they learn from their mistakes here in the sub-continent coming to the World Cup, I see a bright future for us,” de Villiers predicted.
The elegant batsman said that it was all about confidence and momentum, which at the moment the visitors were lacking and thus were short of confidence going into the final game of their tour.
“It obviously is a lot about confidence and momentum. We have learnt quite a lot of lessons but playing with confidence and momentum is pretty tough at the moment. So we want to finish on a high note out here, get some good memories behind us before we come back here for the World Cup,” he said.
“We have got a lot of cricket before then, so we got lots of time to get some confidence behind us and build some nice spirit in the team. Like I said, the one-day team is pretty young. We will definitely get things right.
“(Coach) Corrie (van Zyl) and the management team have been working very hard, taking notes about where we went wrong. Most importantly, we would like to finish on a high tomorrow and show exactly what we are capable of,” he elaborated.
The batsman said he had lot of good memories of this venue having done well not only in the Test on his last visit here but also in the Champions Trophy in 2006.
