New Zealand 221-8 (Ryder 83, Morkel 3-46) beat South Africa 172 (Kallis 45, Oram 4-39) by 49 runs.

On paper it looked to be the most mismatched of all four quarter finals. The best balanced side in the tournament, with what was unmistakeably the best bowling line up, against a team who had confident wins against Pakistan and Zimbabwe but failed against Sri Lanka and Australia. Ross Taylor’s blazing century against Pakistan aside, there was little to suggest that this Black Caps side was poised to set the tournament alight.

The Proteas treated their supporters to yet another clinical performance as they crushed Bangladesh by 206 runs to send the co-hosts crashing out of the World Cup while South Africa rocketed to the top of Group B.

South Africa decided to rest Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel and AB de Villiers, which might have given Bangladesh some hope.

Saturday 12 March was exactly five years to the day since South Africa completed that run chase against Australia. The ghost of 438-9 past came to visit the India and Proteas clash in Nagpur as the World Cup continued to entertain while supporters continued to age about 10 year. Omens all-round.

India won the toss and chose to bat. No surprises, really. And, as expected, it was the Virender Sehwag and Sachin Tendulkar show as the two combined for a first-wicket partnership of 142. Tendulkar notched up his 99th international hundred (that’s in both Tests and ODIs).

South African fans across the country experienced a mixed bag of emotions as the Proteas lost for the first time in their World Cup campaign as England clinched a six wicket victory.

Those who got up to catch the start of the action at 6am were treated to a superb spell of bowling by Robin Peterson as Andrew Struass, Kevin Pietersen and Ian bell all fell cheaply and England were in a spot of bother at 15 for three.

The 7th match of group B saw South Africa face the West Indies in Delhi. South Africa won the toss and elected to field first, deciding that dew might play hindrance to the fielding side in the 2nd innings.

With the National Anthems sung and done the 1st innings was under way. West Indies opener CH Gayle faced some opening spin from Botha, a strategy employed by the SA captain to have a spin heavy bowler side, with the exception of Steyn, Kallis and Morkel. This tactic bore fruit early on for SA, seeing Gayle depart for just 2 runs after edging the ball to Kallis at first slip.

The Proteas went into the final ODI at SuperSport Centurion on the back of fantastic support by the South African public. Every ODI in this series has been played in front of capacity crowd and the Centurion fans maintained this form with a sell out of 20 000 spectators.

The pressure was on the Proteas and Graeme Smith as this was both his last home ODI as captain and the last ODI for the team ahead of the world cup.