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South Africa demolish Afghanistan to enter their maiden men’s World Cup final

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6 months ago

June 27, 2024

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South Africa demolish Afghanistan to enter their maiden men’s World Cup final

South Africa 60 for 1 (Hendricks 29*, Farooqi 1-11) beat Afghanistan 56 (Omarzai 10, Shamsi 3-6, Jansen 3-16) by nine wickets

South Africa’s quicks ravaged Afghanistan’s top order, taking five wickets inside the first five overs, to send the opposition spiralling towards their eventual 56 all out in the first semi-final of T20 World Cup 2024.

Then, although they lost Quinton de Kock early, Aiden Markram and Reeza Hendricks calmly navigated the small chase on an exceedingly tricky Tarouba pitch.

For a team infamous for playing jittery cricket in the knockouts, this win was dominant and clinical. South Africa left next to nothing to chance. They bowled beautifully, fielded well, and weathered some difficult early overs while pouncing on the loose balls.

As their reward, they have their first ever berth in a men’s World Cup final, and continued their unbeaten run in the tournament, which now is up to eight matches. The margin of victory, by nine wickets and with 67 balls remaining, underscored the control they exerted on this match, from start to finish.

Jansen and Rabada rip out the top order

The Tarouba surface not only offered lateral movement but also a lot of bounce early on. With the heights that Marco Jansen and Kagiso Rabada bring to the table, South Africa had a great attack to exploit conditions.

Jansen struck at the end of the first over to remove Afghanistan’s batter of the tournament – Rahmanullah Gurbaz – who edged a ball angled across him to Hendricks at slip. In his next over, Jansen bowled Gulbadin Naib through the gate with a delivery that darted back into him.

Rabada’s first over sent Afghanistan really into a nosedive. He jagged two balls back and hit timber on both occasions. The ball that clipped the top of Ibrahim Zadran’s middle stump was the killer – Ibrahim at that point was Afghanistan’s best hope of getting to a good score. Fourth ball, he took out Mohammad Nabi’s off stump with an even more stunning delivery. That over was a double-wicket maiden.

Nortje and Shamsi do the rest

With the top five gone, and their middle order having failed to produce much right through the tournament, Afghanistan were seriously struggling. Anrich Nortje and Tabraiz Shamsi closed down the innings from there. Nortje had Azmatullah Omarzai (the only Afghan batter to get to double figures) caught at deep point, then later knocked out Rashid Khan’s off stump.

Shamsi bowled a leg-stump line to the right-handers and kept getting them lbw as the balls rushed onto them. They reviewed all three decisions, but the on-field umpires had given them out, and umpires’ calls on impact were good enough.

Farooqi and Naveen can’t wreck South Africa’s top order

Coming into this match, Fazalhaq Farooqi and Naveen-ul-Haq had 29 wickets between them. Their only chance of defending such a paltry score was running through the top order together.

Farooqi added to his tournament-high wicket tally in his first over, setting de Kock up with some big outswingers before jagging one back in and making a mess of his stumps.

And Naveen should have had Markram the next over, but most of Afghanistan’s players didn’t hear the thin edge to the wicketkeeper, and Rashid wasn’t sure enough of it to review the decision.

Markram and Hendricks take the chase home

There were still testing moments, as the pitch continued to play up, still often keeping low. But whenever Afghanistan bowled poor deliveries, South Africa’s batters pounced. The fifth over itself yielded 13 runs – more than a fifth of the target. South Africa got home in the ninth over, sparking restrained celebrations, even though this was a historic victory for them.