De Kock shines with bat before South African pacers teach India a lesson

Quinton de Kock scored a powerful half-century as South Africa defeated India by 51 runs in the second T20I in New Chandigarh on Thursday to level the series 1-1.

South Africa's pace attack proved too hot to handle for India, who were bundled out for 162, chasing a target of 214 that was constructed upon a 46-ball 90 from opener de Kock.

Indian openers could not provide the start that the visitors managed as Shubman Gill continued his poor run with a first-ball duck and Abhishek Sharma followed for 17.

Barring Tilak Varma's 34-ball 62 and 17-ball 27 from Jitesh Sharma, there was hardly any indication from the Indian batters that showed they could chase a total in excess of 200. Sanju Samson was dropped for the fifth T20I in a row.

Skipper Suryakumar Yadav, too, failed (5) and Shivam Dube was one of the four victims of Ottneil Baartman. Lungi Ngidi, Marco Jansen and Lutho Sipamla bagged two wickets each.

Having lost the Tests 0-2 and taken the ODIs 2-1, India must work really hard to clinch the five-match T20I series that now heads to Dharamsala for the third game on Sunday.

Brief scores: South Africa 213/4 in 20 overs (Quinton de Kock 90, Donovan Ferreira 30, Aiden Markram 29, Varun Chakravarthy 2/29) bt India 162 in 19.1 overs (Tilak Varma 62, Jitesh Sharma 27, Ottneil Baartman 4/24, Ngidi 2/26, Jansen 2/25, Sipamla 2/46)