Daily Times

SYDNEY: South African fast bowler Lungi Ngidi fears “bad luck is following us” at the Twenty20 World Cup with more rain forecast for their clash against Bangladesh on Thursday in Sydney. South Africa have been touted as outsiders for the title but their opening match on Monday against Zimbabwe in Hobart was washed out. The Proteas had been on course for victory but were forced to settle for one point.

They are eager to get their tournament up and running against Bangladesh, but bad weather is forecast for Sydney. The 26-year-old Ngidi, part of a fearsome South African pace attack, said of the abandoned opener against Zimbabwe: “It does put us under a bit of pressure, it would have been nice to get a win. “Tomorrow another forecast of rain — I think we’ve just got a bit of bad luck following us. “But we’ve got no say in how the weather plays out, the only thing we can do is be prepared to play.”

South Africa, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe are in Group 2 along with the Netherlands, India and Pakistan. The top two will make the semi-finals. Ngidi said they were able to take some positives from the disappointing Zimbabwe outcome. “The energy that we had, the guys were really up for it,” he said. “The guys are here to compete and here to win, that’s the mindset we’re going in with throughout the tournament.

“We got a bit of momentum there (against Zimbabwe) and whatever mistakes we made there we’re going to fix in the next game.” Bangladesh opened their campaign with a nine-wicket win over the Netherlands.