New Zealand pull off a Houdini!!! Oram and Ryder guide them to a superb win against SA.

New Zealand vs South Africa

The Black caps won the toss and chose to bat first on a pitch where out of last 15 matches, the team batting second had won 10 times. South Africa would have believed this is the best chance they have got and would have backed themselves for a win. Probably only Allan Donald and John Wright were the only 2 guys in the world who would have thought NZ has a chance of winning!!!
Batting first, New Zealand had a bad start losing both their openers in 6 overs with 15 runs on board.Ryder and Taylor, the two most impactful players of the New Zealand played a calming battle and put on a 114 runs partnership to take new zealand to a position of some respect. Williamson finished it in style with 38 runs. Jesse Ryder scored 83 and Taylor made 43 runs. The NZ total was a below par 221 runs.
South Africa were on the spot and had the top hand for most of the match's course and looked set to win it with ease with partnerships between Kallis and Smith and then Kallis and De Villiers. Kallis made 47 runs and AB made 35 and it looked like they would run away with a win as they were 107 for 2 and needed just over a hundred runs for a superb win but the way they folded up was miserable. The main turning point of the match was the superb catch of Kallis by Oram off Tim Southee's bowling near the boundary just charged up the Black Caps and from then on it was NZ on fire. Then they tumbled and lost 6 wickets for 38 runs. They finally folded up for 172 runs. New Zealand won by 49 runs. Oram took 4 wickets and Nathan McCullum took 3. Jesse Ryder's 83 runs under a lot of pressure was worth gold in the end.
New Zealand's fielding was definitely the best so far in the whole tournament and this definitely was one of their best performances ever. Vettori was spot on with all the placements and it was like a fort South Africans could not get loose.

 MOM  :  Jacob Oram.
 South Africa have never won a knock out game in the wc since 1992.
This is New Zealands sixth wc semifinals in 10 appearances.

New Zealand 221 (Ryder 83, Morkel 3-46)
South Africa 172 in 43.2 overs (Kallis 47, Oram 4-39)
New Zealand won by 49 runs