India suffered a humiliating defeat by an innings and 32 runs in the first match of the two-match Test series against South Africa at the SuperSport Park in Centurion. This defeat not only shattered India’s dream of winning the Test series in South Africa, but also brought down Rohit Sharma’s team from the top position in the World Test Championship (WTC) points table.
India were unbeaten in the 2023-2025 cycle of the WTC before the first Test against the Proteas. The Asian team had won one Test and drawn the other against West Indies in July. Now, they have tasted defeat for the first time and have slipped to fifth place with 16 points and 44.44 percentage points (PCT). Meanwhile, Temba Bavuma & Co. topped the table with 12 points and 100% win percentage.
SA v IND: Status of World Test Championship points table of Centurion Test match
After South Africa in the points table, Pakistan is at second place with 22 points and 61.11 percentage points in 3 matches. New Zealand is at third position with 12 points and 50 percentage points in 2 matches. After this is Bangladesh. Bangladesh has 12 points and 50 percentage points from 2 matches. The Indian team is at fifth position with 16 points and 44.44 percentage points in 3 test matches.
Talking about the first test of the series, on the basis of KL Rahul’s excellent century, Team India managed to score 245 runs in its first innings against South Africa. When the South African team came to bat in the first innings, the pitch was a little easy for batting. Dean Elgar scored a brilliant 185 runs for the African team.
South Africa took a huge lead of 163 runs in the first innings. In the second innings too, the performance of the Indian batsmen was very poor and they were out for just 131 runs. Virat Kohli fought single-handedly for the team in the second innings, scoring 76 runs in 82 balls. While Kagiso Rabada performed brilliantly by taking five wickets in the first innings, Nandre Berger stole the limelight.
Also read: Khiladi Kumar understands Shikhar Dhawan’s pain