They say the higher you rise, the harder you fall – and England’s double world champions have fallen brutally hard. Even after losing two of their first three World Cup games they promised they could yet scale new heights; against South Africa they plumbed fresh depths: a record number of runs conceded and their biggest losing margin.

With a brilliant batting display South Africa exposed all the frailties of their opponents, physical, mental and technical. England have not yet been definitively eliminated, but after this 229-run defeat it is only a matter of time. The grisly picture is already clear: their old-timers thought this could be one last hurrah. Instead it has been a bridge too far.

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Everything England promised before this game was delivered instead by their opponents. South Africa batted with pugnacious excellence, Reeza Hendricks – playing only because Temba Bavuma came down with a stomach bug overnight – and Rassie van der Dussen laying the foundation with half-centuries before Heinrich Klaasen, with a brilliant 67-ball 109, and Marco Jansen (75 off 42) heaved the game way beyond their opponents’ reach in the final 10 overs, from which they plundered 143 runs.

England were left needing to score 400 and managed 170. They came into this game with six specialist batters, betting that at least a few would come good in a notoriously batting-friendly venue; yet inside 12 overs they were all gone.

South Africa bowled well but sometimes this is a game of the mind and by then England’s were scrambled. A freewheeling 33-ball, 73-run ninth-wicket partnership between Mark Wood and Gus Atkinson made what had gone before seem even more embarrassing.

England had tried to refresh their side, making three changes to the team that lost to Afghanistan last Sunday, but instead of illustrating their depth of talent it exposed a dearth. Even Ben Stokes could not rescue them on this occasion: by the time he picked up his bat England already needed a miracle; he lasted eight balls.

The first sense this was not going to be England’s day came in the seventh over, until which point they had been ascendent. Reece Topley’s international career has been a case of the agony and the further agony, with injuries that seem to seek him out at the worst possible moments. This one was a tracer missile, Van der Dussen thrashing the ball low and just to his left, the ball crashing into Topley’s index finger as he stuck out a paw. A scan is expected to confirm his tournament is over.

In that moment the match shifted. Before Topley’s injury, South Africa had faced 39 balls and scored 20; in the remainder of the powerplay they scored 39 runs and faced 21 and the momentum would never switch again.

From there, England seemed to fall apart. Adil Rashid, suffering from a stomach upset, repeatedly left the field and was obviously uncomfortable for much of the time he was on it, while still managing, as is his way, to be his team’s most effective bowler. David Willey went down with cramp, and Harry Brook called on the physio. At one point even Spidercam needed running repairs.

Topley forced himself back on to the field, taking a couple of wickets, but could not reverse his team’s fortunes, and was not fit enough to bat.

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Towards the end of South Africa’s innings, this genial pastime seemed to have transformed into a brutal endurance event by the hot and humid conditions and it was not just England who suffered. During Klaasen’s innings his own body caused him significantly more trouble than the bowling attack, his rapid scoring more remarkable because of his very obvious discomfort.

As he pushed his side towards a winning total he forced himself closer and closer to complete collapse; in the 47th over, the gymnastics required to evade a Mark Wood yorker left him on the ground and in obvious agony.

Klaasen clambered to his feet, brushed himself down and crashed the next ball over long-on for six and the one after that to fine leg for four, to bring up his century off 61 balls. It was a brutal and brave innings and at the other end Jansen was watching and learning.

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At the point his partner raised his bat, Jansen had scored 35 off 32 and was reaching unexplored territory – he had never scored a half-century in international white-ball cricket and only one in limited-overs cricket of any kind. He scored 39 runs off his next nine balls, long levers swinging through the ball in perfect arcs.

On the plus side, he all but guaranteed the only injury England’s players could possibly sustain in the final overs was a cricked neck. As the ball repeatedly sailed over the boundary, it was probably the only period in this increasingly benighted tournament that things have been looking up for England .