South Africa managed to win a thrilling final ODI to whitewash India 3-0 in the ODI series. India suffered a heartbreaking four-run loss against South Africa in the third and final ODI here at Newlands, Cape Town.
KL Rahul became only the 4th India captain after Kapil Dev, Dilip Vengsarkar, Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli to be on the receiving end of a whitewash in an ODI series .This is India’s first series since Kohli’s resignation of capitancy from the 50-overs format. But the new era has not started on a positive note, with India losing the series.
However, Rohit Sharma is the captain of Team India, although he is not a part of this series due to injury. In his place, KL Rahul was given the captaincy for this series. Neither Rahul’s bat played in the series nor could he do anything special with the captaincy.
After the 2nd ODI in the post-match press conference KL Rahul was asked “whether the India team were missing Virat Kohli’s energy as skipper”? KL Rahul cleverly answered this question. “The energy has been great, it’s been tough on the body staying in the bubbles. We love challenges and we have come short in the first two games, we will look ahead to the third game and try and win that one,”
Yet, India failed to avoid a series whitewash against a South African team in transition despite Deepak Chahar’s scintillating 34-ball 54, losing the third ODI by four runs in Cape Town on Sunday.