Temba Bavuma, the South African captain who won the World Test Championship (WTC), has disclosed that during Saturday's (June 14) final at Lord's, the Australians attempted to sledging his team with the "chokers" tag.  

He claimed that one member of the Pat Cummins-led side attempted to talk about a batting collapse, but Aiden Markram, his batting partner, responded by requesting that the captain "lock in" after each over.

Thanks to a fantastic 143-run partnership between Bavuma and Markram the night before, South Africa won the title on Day 4 with 69 runs and eight wickets remaining. Near the beginning of the day, Bavuma left, but Markram remained steadfast and formed short alliances with David Bedingham and Tristan Stubbs.

“Playing against Australia is a bit different in the last couple of years. They’re not as vocal out on the field. They’re still aggressive through their body language, through obviously their skill, but there’s not a lot of chatter. Of course, the tag of us being chokers that came about this morning.

One of their players threw out the fact that we could lose our eight wickets in less than 60 runs. I definitely heard that. Aiden kept using the [words] lock in after every over. Let’s keep locking in. Let’s give them nothing. So yeah, not a lot of chatter, just one or two things that were, that were said," Bavuma said after the match as per Cricket Next.

Due to several close calls in which their teams wasted match-winning chances in the knockout stages, South Africa have not won a major men's ICC trophy since 1998.

It's "quite a big thing" for his team to permanently remove the tag, according to Markram, who received Player of the Match for his 136 (207).

“It would be great not to have to hear it again, that’s for sure. In terms of it motivating you, I mean, there’s always going to be external things that can motivate you, but it’s not your sole purpose for playing. To have got the job done and to literally have got the job done and to get rid of that is quite a big thing for this team,” Markram said.

(ANI inputs)