Proteas and rain in World Cups: Still no match for Thami and co's wretched luck in Sri Lanka

Following an agonising no-result against Zimbabwe in their opening match of the ICC T20 World Cup on Monday, the Proteas travel to Melbourne staring a forecast for a 80% chance of showers and a thunderstorm squarely in the face ahead of their meeting with Bangladesh on Thursday.

Another abandonment would severely compromise South Africa's ability to reach the knockouts unless some of their opponents suffer similar fates or experience wild swings in form.

While a lot has been, understandably, said and written about the Proteas' complicated history with rain in showpiece tournaments before, the most extreme example is arguably Anton Ferreira's national Under-19 team of 2000.

Jetting to Sri Lanka, the squad arrived on the Island with high hopes given that they boasted men like skipper Thami Tsolekile, Graeme Smith, Jacques Rudolph, Johan Botha, Albie Morkel and Andrew Puttick, all men who would go on to play international cricket.

When they came back, the Baby Proteas won the lowly Plate Trophy though it was hardly because they played poorly - it was purely because they couldn't.

READ | Proteas, World Cups and rain: An unending sorry story that could scupper another campaign

All three of their first-round fixtures were freakishly rained off, by default demoting them to the Plate, where they finished unbeaten.

It started at the Air Force Ground in Katunayake, situated just outside the capital Colombo, where South Africa were meeting Nepal.

Rudolph ended with an unbeaten 156 - still the highest individual score for the Under-19s - in a total of 295 before the bowlers and some fine fielding reduced their opponents to 24/4.

The rain came and that was that.

However, it shouldn't have been because, after it stopped at around 15:50 the