South Africa v India Third T20I: Latest Odds & Analysis

South Africa v India predictions: 

• South Africa opening partnership over 20.5 runs - 1.9 @ Bet365
• Shubman Gill under 28.5 runs - 1.83 @ Bet365
• Tabraiz Shamsi under 1.5 wickets - 1.4 @ Bet365

When: Thursday 14 December, 8:30pm IST 

Where: Wanderers Stadium, Johannesburg

Watch: Star Sports, Hotstar (Supersport in South Africa)

Best Odds: South Africa 2.05, India 1.85

Owing to the washed out series opener in Durban, the best India can only hope for is to get away with a drawn series at the Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg, where the weather forecast is much more encouraging.

They didn’t help their cause in the second T20I by losing both openers (Yashasvi Jaiswal and Shubman Gill) for ducks in the first two overs, but a significant change in conditions following a mid-innings rain delay in their run chase severely hampered things.

With no rain in the way, both batting units should get a fair go at piling on a big score. 

Cricket betting sites are anticipating big scores and a tight contest, giving India very narrow favouritism on the basis of South Africa releasing Gerald Coetzee and Marco Jansen to prepare for the Boxing Day Test.

The chances of South Africa handing out a cap or two is likely, which furthers India’s case for a series-levelling victory.

The Numbers That Matter

• South Africa lost six of their last nine T20Is in Johannesburg
• Heinrich Klaasen has only one half-century from his last 21 T20I innings
• Teams that score 175+ batting first in Johannesburg have a 73% win rate compared with 24% for those who don’t
• Reeza Hendricks’ last six home T20Is: 49, 42, 3, 56, 83, 68

Another strong start for Proteas batters

With most of the runs coming off the bat of T20 superstar Reeza Hendricks, South Africa’s opening stand raced away to 42 from 16 balls before debutant Matthew Breetzke threw himself under the bus with an embarrassing runout that surely won’t be repeated.

He showed no fear in Arshdeep Singh’s opening over as the threat of rain prompted South Africa’s top order to go hard from ball one.

Sadly for their regular opener Temba Bavuma, it appears that the Proteas’ opening partnership has been better off without him. 

The 42 that this pair put on in Gqeberha was the ninth of South Africa’s last 12 opening partnerships involving Reeza Hendricks but not Temba Bavuma (so either Quinton de Kock or Breetzke) that cleared the 20.5 run mark set by Bet365 for this game.

It’s a decent sample size and one that suggests they’re more likely than not to get off to another positive start, especially at the high scoring Wanderers.

Prediction: South Africa opening partnership over 20.5 runs - 1.9 @ Bet365

Gill’s T20 struggles carry on

Those followers of this blog who backed Shubman Gill to score less than 28.5 runs in the second T20I would have loved watching him trapped in front by Lizaad Williams in just the second over of the match.

The absence of Coetzee and Jansen guarantees Williams’ place as an opening bowler for the remainder of the series and means he’ll almost certainly get another chance to replicate his heroics.

For Shubman, it was yet another T20 international failure. His career average of 27.63 is terribly flattering, masking the regularity with which he has been unable to make an impact so far in this format.

Nine of Gill’s 12 T20I innings saw him score 11 or fewer runs, and yet the bookmakers have increased his line run for this match to 28.5, presumably because of the better batting conditions that Johannesburg is likely to present. 

Prediction: Shubman Gill under 28.5 runs - 1.83 @ Bet365

Another quiet day for Shamsi

It feels like we’re just backing more of the same here! But some of the statistical patterns identified throughout this series have been far too compelling to ignore. Here’s another one.

It is probably more of a booster to your accumulator bet than a standout bet in its own right, due to its skinny odds, but it looks like an easy winner. 

India’s batters looked comfortable just trying to keep Tabraiz Shamsi quiet in Gqeberha, conceding nine dots and knocking him around for 12 singles whilst scoring only one boundary across his four overs.

The silver lining was that they restricted him to just one wicket, taking Shamsi’s record against India to just six wickets from 11 matches (33.4 overs). 

He has never taken more than one wicket against India in that time, so you’ll be tremendously unlucky if this is the occasion he breaks the drought. 

Fortunately, his record in Johannesburg (six wickets from six T20Is) also suggests this won’t be the day.

Prediction: Tabraiz Shamsi under 1.5 wickets - 1.4 @ Bet365