Bavuma hopeful for future after bittersweet World Cup exit

Despite being knocked out of the T20 World Cup in the Super 12s stage, South Africa captain Temba Bavuma was hopeful that his team can take the learnings from the tournament to build for the future.

South Africa needed a big win against group topper England on Saturday in order to pip Australia for the remaining semifinal berth. They managed to edge Eoin Morgan's side by 10 runs, but inferior Net Run Rate meant the Proteas were out of the competition.

"Win was important, but a bittersweet ending for us. Achieved what we wanted to do in terms of winning, but didn't win well enough," Bavuma said in the post-match presentation. 

Riding on Rassie van der Dussen's 94 not out and Aiden Makram's 52 not out, South Africa put up 189/2 in 20 overs, but were unable to restrict England under 60 runs.

"We gave our all with the bat and with the ball. Start of the tournament it (NRR) wasn't a big factor, we felt we wanted to win the game. Tough to bring NRR into effect in our last game, especially against a side like England," Bavuma said.

South Africa beat West Indies, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and England, which Bavuma felt will provide them with valuable lessons for the future.

"But very proud of the side and think there's a lot we can take away from this. We've got to build on the confidence and momentum, this will give us experience and learnings we can take from this World Cup going forward," he said.

England captain Eoin Morgan felt the dew at Sharjah was an important factor in deciding the outcome of the match.

"Thought it was a good wicket, SA came hard at us and batted well. Thought we bowled reasonably well and held them to a par score. Coming off, with the dew coming in, we thought we were right in it. Jason Roy going down doesn't help, but we thought we were right in it throughout. Every game tests us in different ways," he said.