India vs South Africa: 'Execution was spot-on,' says Rishabh Pant after 3rd T20I win

Rishabh Pant heaped praise on Team India after their victory over South Africa in their must-win third T20I on Tuesday.

After suffering a loss in the opening two games of the five-match T20I series, India defeated the Proteas by 48 runs to remain alive in the series. India posted 179 for 5 in 20 overs before an excellent show from the bowlers saw the hosts bowl out South Africa at 131 in 19.1 overs.

"The execution was spot-on from the bowlers and the batters. We were 15 runs short, but we weren't thinking about that. Bowlers did a fantastic job for us. In India, spinners play a big role. There is pressure on them, when they come off nicely matches as this happen.

When you get a good start, it's difficult for a new batter to come in and go big straight away. We lost too many wickets. We'll look to improve in the next match. We have to make sure that we finish the game with a bigger margin," said Pant after India's win in Visakhapatnam on Tuesday.

Coach asked me to back my strengths, says Yuzvendra Chahal

Leg spinner Yuzvendra Chahal was named the Player of the Match for his figures of 3 for 20 in his quota of four overs.

"I bowled a lot of sliders and bowled quicker in the previous matches. Today, I changed my seam position. Spinning and getting the ball to dip are my strengths. Today I tried to get it to turn and bowl slower. I tried to bowl to my strengths, I focused on that. When batters try to reverse-sweep, it becomes tough for the bowlers. But now I have a second plan and set fields accordingly. I didn't bowl well in the previous game, the coach asked me to back my strengths," Chahal said at the post-match presentation.

Harshal Patel picked up four wickets for 25 runs in 3.1 overs. Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Axar Patel also bagged a wicket each.

Meanwhile, Harshal said that the Indian team had certain plans in place but it did not work out in the opening two fixtures of the series.

"It was a must-win game to keep the series alive, pretty happy I did it in this game. Depends on how you look at it, again that old cliche, you follow the process, stay true when you are doing well or not, those are the things that carry you through bad phases and get you to improve when you are doing well. We have certain goals as a bowling group and we want to continue to achieve those goals," added Harshal.

The fourth T20I is scheduled to take place on Friday at Saurashtra Cricket Association Stadium, Rajkot.