Reece Topley reprimanded by ICC after hitting stumps in frustration

England’s Reece Topley has received an official reprimand for breaching Level 1 of the ICC Code of Conduct during the first Twenty20 worldwide against South Africa in Cape Town on Friday.

The hosts needed 15 off the final over to win and that’s exactly what they managed as Reece Topley missed the chance of a run-out which would have sent the match into a super over and possibly extended England’s T20 winning streak.

South Africa seemed out of the game when they had lost David Miller, their sixth wicket, still needing 21 runs off 11 deliveries to overhaul England’s score of 134 for eight. Morris first up smashed a low full toss from Topley for a four and followed it up with a six in the wide long-on region to reduce the equation to 4 off 3 balls. A dot ball cranked up the tension and Morris forced the next delivery down the ground for two setting up the final ball decider.

Apparently, both the teams, England and South Africa will take on each other in the World T20 as well as they are placed in the same group.

Root went a ball later as England’s innings stagnated with Eoin Morgan continuing his poor run of form shortly afterwards. He is really disappointed but he has a huge amount of character and resolve and a huge amount of skill. The series has already produced examples of players who have been criticised but returned to star for their team.

He said: “I guess if people look at it they would say that batting is our strongest suit – so to keep building on those kind of performances as a bowling unit… means we can only take confidence from it, especially going into the “World Cup”.

“That’s a massive get-out-of-jail card”, admitted Faf Du Plessis, the South Africa T20 captain.

“We probably lost the game with the bat”.

Tahir, a cult hero for his wild celebrations, came close to a hat-trick with a googly that bamboozled Chris Jordan but just missed the stumps.

The mandate will be clear: Get as many runs as possible on the board if batting first and bowl as cunningly as possible if not.

Then Hales was the first of two big wickets to fall for the addition of only a single – although in Tahir’s first over, JP Duminy and Kagiso Rabada running back from short fine-leg were lucky to avoid injury, let alone complete the dismissal, from a steeping mis-timed sweep.

De Villiers, though, top-edged Jordan to Hales in the fifth over and Amla was caught sharply at mid-on by Willey an over later, having been shelled on 14 by Buttler.

Morris had clubbed 62 from 38 balls to carry his side to an unlikely win in the fourth ODI against England in Johannesburg seven days earlier. That equation was 32 from 17 when Moeen dismissed Du Plessis and Rilee Rossouw.