Port Elizabeth, Jan 22:South African left-handed batsman J P Duminy was a pleased man on receiving the Man-of-the-Match award for his unbeaten knock of 71 runs in the fourth ODI against India. Duminy’s inspired innings helped revive the hosts after they had reached the unenviable score of 118/5 in the 23rd over.

Post-match, a delighted Duminy shared his thoughts on his contribution to the vital win.

Excerpts from the chat

On what was going through his mind when wickets were falling around him

Try to take it as deep as possible and try and cash in at the end. Unfortunately we lost wickets [at a] crucial time in the game. [They] didn’t allow us to play freely but I thought we had a defendable total in the end.

On the good running between the wickets with Johan Botha and later with Robin Peterson

Yeah, I guess that’s a strength of mine. I’m pretty quick between the wickets and obviously my partners were as well, so we cash in on that.

On whether he was worried about not scoring enough boundaries

No, not actually. I thought we were getting the target that we wanted - between four and six an over. And anything is possible [with a consistent run-rate]. So it worked out quite nicely.

On the shifting targets set by South Africa for themselves during the course of their innings

I think when we got to 45 overs, we thought 250 would definitely be a good score. We obviously got a little more than that so we were pretty pleased with the result.

On whether his unbeaten knock here makes up for the forgettable shot he played at Cape Town

Yeah, definitely [I made up for that lapse] this time round.