‘We are heading in the right direction’

South Africa bowed out of the Twenty20 World up on Saturday but coach Mark Boucher said the young team is headed in the "right direction" and will soon be rewarded with a trophy.

The Proteas won their final Super 12 league match in Sharjah to hand England their first loss in the tournament but the effort was not enough top earn a place in the semi-finals.

They finished level with group toppers England and second-placed Australia on eight points but the Aussies went to the final four thanks to a better run-rate.

Rassie van der Dussen hit an unbeaten 94 to guide South Africa to 189-2 but they needed to limit England to fewer than 131 runs to edge out Australia.

England finished on 179-9 after a last-over hat-trick by pace bowler Kagiso Rabada. "This team knows that we are on a journey, upward curve, that we are learning along the way. You know, we are by no means are a finished product," said Boucher.

"These games will stand us in very good stead because as I said, every game we played was under pressure. It's a young side. We are still developing and hopefully we can go from strength-to-strength, take this confidence through, as well. "So we are heading in the right direction. We just need a bit of good luck and a bit of fortune to go our way and hopefully we can put something in the trophy cabinet soon."