Scorecard

A South African revival was at hand. The moment skipper Graeme Smith tossed the ball to his predecessor Shaun Pollock to open the bowling, he was in a better position to have a clear view of what captaincy is all about. In sum, it is getting the best out of your players.

In the end, Smith managed to do just that, as South Africa overhauled India's total of 215, with a match-winning performance from Neil McKenzie, who top-scored with 80, and an unbeaten 44 from wicketkeeper Mark Boucher.

The 107-run partnership between the duo saw South Africa pull one back against India, in the last league encounter of the TVS Cup, at the Bangabandhu stadium in Dhaka, and set the stage for an interesting final on Sunday.

The dress rehearsal has gone South Africa's way. And with India's bad record in tournament finals -- barring the NatWest Trophy -- the pressure will be on them to win and cap a truly successful season, which saw them reach the World Cup final.

Pollock began proceedings with a maiden and set the tone for a disciplined and planned Proteas assault. The experiment with left-arm seamer Charl Willoughby was discarded as Makhaya Ntini and Pollock -- South Africa's best bowlers -- showed why they are still a threat.   

The green-tinged wicket must have surely darkened the mood of the Indian batsmen and when Ntini angled one across to Gautam Gambhir, the man-of-the-match of the last game against Bangladesh, the left-hander got a feather touch to the ball, which flew to Andrew Hall at first slip. 

Spurred by the early success and the grass on the wicket, Ntini bowled a torrent of short-pitched deliveries one of which stung Sehwag on his right forearm and forced him off the field.

Mohammad Kaif, despite an unbeaten 95 against South Africa in the last encounter between the two sides, seemed uncertain. Ganguly batted with the confidence of a man in form and was notably confident against the short-pitched stuff. 

Smith then switched the game-plan around and asked his bowlers to bowl at a much slower speed and without offering any driving length deliveries to the Indian batters.

Between the 12th and 18th overs, Kaif and Ganguly managed to score just 15 runs; the pressure showed on Kaif, who tried to get things going and offered a simple catch to Jacques Rudolph, who dropped the sitter.

After scratching around for 30 runs, Kaif, however, played Alan Dawson early and dragged the ball onto his stumps.

In a strange move, Smith took Dawson off the attack and brought Pollock in. What prompted the change is as intriguing as the move when Smith held Pollock back till the 20th over in the earlier encounter between the two teams.

Ganguly reached his half-century and launched into attack mode against left-arm spinner Paul Adams, who made a comeback of sorts into the team after a long lay-off, teeing him back over his head for six.

The Indian batsmen just failed miserably with their shot selection. Skipper Ganguly started the slide, slamming an Adams full toss straight down Pollock's throat at long-off. The awful shot-selection trend turned endemic as Sanjay Bangar, trying to play Ntini across the line, found himself in between the ball and stumps. India slumped to 146-4 from 124-2.

Bangar's batting has corroded severely, and with pedestrian fielding ability his retention in the side seems a touch unfair for middle-order batsman Abhijeet Kale in the tournament.

In a brave show of character, Sehwag, with his forearm swathed in bandage, walked out to bat again and sent Andrew Hall over point for six. But the restricted movement in his arm induced a top-edge that was safely taken in the covers. The brave effort only fizzled into a moral victory. 

The Indian innings lost its way and along with it any sort of momentum for the final blitz. Every batsman got starts and threw them away. Dinesh Mongia, who batted diligently for 29, offered the simplest of catches in the covers when it was left to him to guide the broken Indian innings to a 240-plus total.

The lower order batsmen just failed to add much to the board and were 192-9 with another four overs to be bowled. Parthiv Patel, Harbhajan Singh and Ajit Agarkar played sans any application or responsibility.

The selectors need to decide whether they include Agarkar in the side for his all-round abilities -- which are invisible to say the least --- or he plays as a specialist bowler. For, when Ashish Nehra and Zaheer Khan return, it would be a tragedy if Agarkar is preferred ahead of Salvi merely because he has a century at the Lord's.

Sarandeep Singh then batted with the same maturity he had displayed when he partnered Rahul Dravid in a century partnership in the Guyana Test last year. Along with Aavishkar Salvi, who bats as badly as his idol Glen McGrath, Sarandeep saw the Indian total cross the 200-run mark. The 23-run partnership for the last wicket frustrated the South Africans, who displayed yet another bad fielding performance. 215 still seemed a rather achievable total with the South African batting coming good as the tournament progressed.

The South Africans bowled to a plan with Ntini peppering the batsmen with the short stuff -- he bowled 18 of them -- while Dawson tested the batters, bowling eighty per cent of his deliveries on the good length spot varying his pace to good effect.

Salvi has all the ingredients of becoming a serious pace bowler for India. Today, he showed yet another facet of his temperament, learning from the mistakes he committed against Bangladesh. Recalibrating his line he induced an edge off the South African skipper to have him caught at the wicket. His first spell of seven overs cost a mere 22 runs, with two maidens and the prized wicket of Smith.

Herschelle Gibbs and Boeta Dippenaar saw Salvi and Agarkar off after the early departure of the skipper. Gibbs, in fact, was lucky when he edged Salvi to first slip fielder Sehwag only to see the umpire signal a no ball.

But luck deserted the batsmen, who failed to survive 'Turbanator' Harbhajan Singh's ambush. An ambitious drive by Dippenaar saw the ball curl in prodigiously and dislodge the leg-stump bail. Two balls later Gibbs erred in judging the turn, failed to offer a shot and was sent on his way as umpire Billy Bowden's crooked finger spoke. At 42-3, the repair process had to start all over again for the South Africans.

Neil McKenzie and left-handed Jacques Rudolph did just that and batted with watchfulness, playing the spinners late and with soft hands. A fifty-run partnership saw the score cross 100 before Rudolph (37) played to the wrong line and saw an intended shot to mid-on fly to cover fielder Kaif. (105-4).

Rudolph's dismissal turned the tide South Africa's way as new man Mark Boucher upped the scoring rate. The 21 overs between over number 12 and 32 fetched the South Africans 65 runs. After Boucher came to the crease the same amount of runs were scored in 10 overs; 24 of those runs came in two overs bowled by Dinesh Mongia and Ajit Agarkar.

The startling statistics beg the question: why Harbhajan Singh was held back for so long while the South African batsmen were slowly, but steadily, concentrating and collecting the singles, trying to get as close as they could to the target. Agarkar's 14 runs in the 41st over took the game away from India.

At a time when India needed a wicket, the wisdom in giving the ball to Agarkar was unfounded. Salvi had been the better of the two bowlers today and by picking Agarkar ahead of him to get a breakthrough seemed rather bizarre. Holding Harbhajan Singh's four overs till the death matched the previous decision in oddity.

By the time Harbhajan came onto bowl, McKenzie had got a measure of the wicket and could spot the ball like a melon. When he was finally dismissed for a match-winning 80 off 110 balls South Africa were four runs away from victory.

94 singles were picked between Rudolph, McKenzie and Boucher as skipper Ganguly employed a spread field instead of attacking trying to take wickets. Boucher scored a 46-ball 44 with 28 singles and only 14 dots, a clinical innings under pressure.

The 107-run partnership between Boucher and McKenzie showcased a perfect chase in limited-overs version of the game as South Africa romped home by five wickets and eight balls to spare.

The final on Sunday will make for an interesting contest.