South Africa’s bowling unit endured a harsh reality check during their warm-up clash against India on Wednesday night, with consultant Albie Morkel pointing to flat, batter-friendly Indian surfaces as a major challenge ahead of the T20 World Cup 2026.

Once India raced to 83 runs inside the powerplay at the DY Patil Stadium, the contest quickly slipped away from the Proteas. Ishan Kishan set the tone with a blistering 53 off just 20 balls, before Tilak Varma (45 off 19) and Hardik Pandya (30 off 10) continued the assault to propel India to a daunting 240/5. While the match carried no competitive consequence, the ease with which South Africa’s bowlers were dismantled raised concerns. Apart from Lungi Ngidi, who conceded just over seven runs an over, every bowler went at nine runs per over or more.

Morkel admitted that bowling in Indian conditions leaves little room for error, especially under lights. He highlighted the lack of bounce, skiddy surfaces and heavy evening dew as factors that tilt the balance heavily in favour of batters.

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“It’s a brutal environment as a bowler to come out and do your thing,” Morkel said after the match, as quoted by IOL. “There’s not a lot of bounce in the wickets. It’s low bounce, skiddy, and with a lot of dew in the evening. As a bowler, you’ve got your work cut out for you.”

Despite the heavy defeat, Morkel stressed that South Africa would treat the outing as a learning opportunity rather than a setback. He said the team would return to the drawing board, gather feedback from the bowlers and fine-tune their plans ahead of the tournament.

“We tried a few things tonight, which we were happy about, but it’s back to the drawing board for us to get feedback from the bowlers as well. That’s important,” he added.

One of the positives for the Proteas was Ngidi’s ability to recover after a costly opening over. Morkel praised the seamer’s adaptability and variety, particularly his effective slower balls, which could play a key role as the tournament progresses.

“After his first over, he came back beautifully, and that’s probably going to be his role in the team. He’s one of the seamers who has a really good slower ball, and we’ll be looking to use that a lot more through the tournament,” Morkel said.

South Africa will look to address their bowling concerns quickly when they begin their T20 World Cup 2026 campaign against Canada in Ahmedabad on Monday.