South Africa pace spearhead Vernon Philander has called his struggles in The Oval Test ‘really bad’ after the stomach virus troubled him throughout the game, not allowing him to give his best like he did in the first two matches.
“It was more draining from a fluid point of view because I couldn’t really keep anything down. So yeah, it was really bad,” Philander said.
Philander had shown the symptoms on the morning of the match but captain Faf du Plessis included him in the playing only to see the gamble backfiring miserably.
He spent the second night of the match in hospital on a drip and was frequently unable to bowl, as he had to make back the time he had spent off the pitch ill.
The right-arm pacer said bowling in parts only made the matters worse for him.
“I think it probably got a lot worse having to bowl and having obviously lost quite a lot of fluids top and the bottom, but that night in hospital obviously being in a drip revitalised me, so to speak. But then in the morning it just came out again,” he said.
He further said that he could not give his best but refrained from giving any excuse for South Africa’s heavy 239-run defeat and urged his teammates to rise to the occasion for the final Test, starting on Friday (August 4) at Old Trafford.
“Even having gone out there and having bowled when I’m probably 70-80%, I could feel my intensity was missed. There are no excuses, we lost the Test match. Like I said we had a couple of hard chats amongst us and we need to step up coming Friday,” he said.
Philander, who was the Man of the Match in the second game, bowled only 32 overs in the match and was wicketless in the second innings, as England took a 2-1 series lead.
After the defeat, du Plessis had admitted that Philander missing the major part of the first innings was ‘unfortunate’ for the Proteas. Philander’s early wickets on day 1 had reduced England to 120 for four but his absence on the second day proved costly for the Proteas, as England recovered to post 353 which paved their way for the big win.
“I think that someone like Vernon missing in the first innings was unfortunate. Credit to the English team for getting 350 here. Vernon is one of our world class performers and we take him at almost 50 percent. We knew he was going to be sick but we took him in and thought, we will give him a day. He consistently lands in good areas and we missed him in the first innings,” Du Plessis had said.