AUSTRALIA: Australia (AUS) narrowly defeated Afghanistan (AFG) by four runs in their T20 World Cup 2022 Super 12 match at the Adelaide Oval in Adelaide, on Friday.
Rashid Khan almost took Afghanistan past the finish line with an unbeaten knock of 48 runs off 23 balls.
Australia innings
David Warner and Cameron Green opened the innings for Australia at Adelaide. Warner was looking in good touch today as he was playing some good shots. Due to a strong start, Australia scored 22 runs in just 2 overs.
After the 2nd over, Australia lost its first wicket. Cameron Greene’s dismissal changed the game’s momentum as Warner and Smith got out in the final over of the power play. At that time, AUS was 52-3.
After this, Marsh scored 45 runs of 30 balls before getting caught by the keeper while playing a slog. This helped AUS to reach 88-4 by the end of the 11th over.
Stoinis and Maxwell were hitting the ball powerfully, especially Maxwell. Both the players added 47 runs in the last 4.2 overs and pushed AUS to 133-4 by the end of the 15th over. But, in the next over, Stoinis (25) was dismissed by Rashid.
Australia needed to score some big runs to increase their run rate. But, in the last 5 overs, Australia scored only 35 runs and losht 4 wickets in it.
The final score was 168-8, and Maxwell was the top score with 54* runs. Naveen was the peak of the bowlers with 3 wickets.
Afghanistan innings
Rahmanullah Gurbaz and Usman Ghani opened the innings for Afghanistan. However, AFG faced an unfortunate loss as Ghani got out in the third over.
Just before the power play AFG also lost Gurbaaz (30). At the end of the power play, they were 47-2.
After the end of the 10th over, AFG was 74 -2 and needed 94 runs from 60 balls to win. AFG players Gulbadin and Ibrahim built a good partnership.
But in the 14th over, an exceptional direct throw from Maxwell ran out a dangerous-looking Gulbadin (39). In the same over, Zampa took 2 more wickets of Afghanistan and trimmed down their chances of winning.
At the end of the 14th over, AFG was 101-5 and needed 68 runs from 36 balls to win the match.
After Zampa’s fantastic over, AFG kept losing wickets in quick succession.
However, AFG all-rounder Rashid Khan had other plans, as he did not want Australia to win the game so easily. Rashid took the reins of Australia’s hands and started troubling the Australian bowlers in the last three overs. Rashid almost took the game from Australia’s hand with his great 48 runs from just 23 deliveries.
Due to Rashid’s extraordinary efforts, in the last 6 balls, AFG just needed 22 runs. In the end, AFG lost the game only by 4 runs.
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