T20IWC : South Africa trounce Afghanistan by 9 wkts & power to WC final
Afghanistan reached the semi-finals of the T20 World Cup by winning against countries like New Zealand, Australia and Bangladesh. But Rashid Khan & Co did not win against South Africa. Batting first, Afghanistan scored only 56 runs. South Africa took 8.5 overs to get that run. Proteas in T20 World Cup final after winning by 9 wickets.
Rashid won the toss and decided to bat. He wanted to exploit the team's bowling later. Rashid knows his team's strength is bowling. So he thought that if he bowled later, he would have more chances to win the match. But it was not thought that the batting disaster of Afghanistan would be like this. Neither batsman could settle down at the crease. Trinidad had swing on the pitch. South African pacers used that as tye pitch suited them. Rahmanullah Gurbaj & others could not handle the power of their swing.
Marco Jansen and others started taking wickets from the first over. Afghan batters were struggling to understand the speed of the ball and the power of the swing on the green pitch. If a team loses 5 wickets in the power play, it becomes difficult to get back into the match. The Protea quicks used the seam & swing to great effect & mostly kept the ball on the stumps resulting in many bowled & lbw dismissals . Afghanistan lost 5 wickets for 28 runs in the power play. The Afghan team does not have the batsmen to turn the team around from there as well as less experience to combat these seaming conditions. So Afghanistan innings ended within 56 runs. Jansen and Tabrez Shamsi took three wickets each. Kagiso Rabada and Nortje took two wickets each.
A target of 56 runs, that too in the semi-finals of the T20 World Cup. The South African batters did not think it would be such an easy task. Quinton de Kock scored 5 runs and got bowled but there was no difficulty in winning the match. South Africa won the match in 8.5 overs with Hendricks (29*) running into some form. Fazlhaq Farooqui took the only wicket.
Marco Jansen for his 3/16 was the player of the match . His pace , bounce and swing proved too much for the Afghanistan batters.
South Africa in the World Cup final for the first time. Before this, they had to lose in the semi-finals several times in world cups across formats . Who to play against in the final will be decided on Thursday night. The match in which India and England will face each other. The winner of these two teams will reach the finals. The T20 World Cup final will be held on June 29.
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