After defeats in the ODI series and the one-off Test, South Africa began their run to the T20 World Cup with a morale-boosting victory over India in the first T20I in Chennai.

Starring in the win were Tazmin Brits  whose 81 – an innings of contrasts – set South Africa up along with Marizane Kapp,  The pair added 96 in just 9.2 overs; Kapp’s own contribution was a robust 33-ball 57 as the visitors posted 189 for 4.

India’s chase began well with Smriti Mandhana’s  30-ball 46, but her wicket slowed things down considerably, until they found their ammunition through Jemimah Rodrigues’ punchy 29-ball half-century.

Eventually, the target proved steep as South Africa’s spinners used the slow pitch and the absence of dew to their advantage. In the end, India fell 12 runs short after flirting with the possibility of a heist when Rodrigues brought the equation down from 47 off 18 to 21 off six.

Laura Wolvaardt came out all guns blazing and took Renuka Singh for 16 runs in the third over. But South Africa weren’t able to build on that with Brits, at this point, struggling to hit the ball off the square.

Brits took 10 deliveries to get off the mark and the piling up of dots made Wolvaardt take more risks than she would’ve liked. One such stroke – walking across to expose all three stumps in a bid to sweep left-arm spinner Radha Yadav into acres of open space – led to her downfall in the eighth over to leave South Africa 50 for 1.

Kapp began with two fours off her first three balls, the first one, an inside-out drive over extra cover, particularly attractive. But she was also massively lucky to be reprieved twice in the 10th over.

First, Richa Ghosh failed to hang on to a catch behind the stumps when Kapp was on 11 and then Mandhana put down a tough chance at the long-off fence with the South African allrounder on 11. This helped unleash Kapp, which reduced the pressure Brits after she had limped to a run-a-ball 25 at the 10-over mark.

Fighting a back injury, Kapp had shelved her sweeps for large periods during the Test match between these two teams a few days ago. But in perhaps a sign that she was feeling heaps better, Kapp displayed different variations of her sweeps as her innings progressed – the full-blooded ones, the paddles, the scoops and even the reverse – during a 30-ball half-century that injected momentum into South Africa’s innings.

Brits broke the shackles in the 11th over when she heaved legspinner S Asha over the long-on boundary, even as Kapp went berserk at the other end in their near-century stand.

Brits should’ve been out on 50 when she top-edged a slog, only for Ghosh to grass the opportunity. It would prove game-changing in a sense as Ghosh, who was hit on the chin by the ball rebounding off her gloves, while tumbling to the floor was ruled out of the rest of the game due to concussion.

It took Brits until the 17th over of the innings to hit top gear, when she launched Radha for back-to-back sixes to offset any pressure from Kapp’s wicket in the same over. South Africa ransacked 58 runs off the last five to head into the break with momentum firmly with them.

Brief scores:

South Africa Women  189 for 4 in 20 overs (Laura Wolvaardt 33, Tazmin Brits 81, Marizanne Kapp 57; Pooja Vastrakar 2-23, Radha Yadav 2-40) beat India Women  177 for 4 in 20 overs (Jemimah Rodrigues 53*, Smriti Mandhana 46, Harmanpreet Kaur 35; Ayabonga Khaka 1-39,   Chloe Tryon 1-32,  Nadine de Klerk 1-30, Nonkululeko Mlaba 1-32) by 12 runs