In the important match of the World Cup, Afghanistan defeated Pakistan by 8 wickets and knocked them out of the World Cup race. .
Afghanistan had a big upset of the World Cup by defeating the defending champions England, they have been defeated in three matches so far.
In this match played at Chennai’s P Chidambaram Stadium, Pakistan had given Afghanistan a target of 283 runs to win, which Afghanistan achieved in the 49th over.
In pursuit of the target, the Afghanistan team also played a great lead, where the openers Rahmanullah Garbaz and Ibrahim Zadran did not let the Pakistani bowlers run. The Afghan batsmen started scoring runs fearlessly and built a partnership of 130 runs. His first wicket fell on 130 runs when Shaheen Afridi caught out Rahmanullah Garbaz, he played an innings of 63 runs.
Afghanistan’s run-scoring continued but suffered their second loss in the form of Ibrahim Ibrahim Zadran for 190. Ibrahim Zadran played a brilliant innings of 87 runs, he was dismissed by Hasan Ali. In the match, Pakistan won the toss and decided to bat first.
Openers Imam-ul-Haq and Abdullah Shafiq gave Pakistan a cautious start, with the national batsmen completing the team’s fifty without losing a wicket.
Imam-ul-Haq was dismissed for 17 runs on a total of 56, then captain Babar Azam came to support Abdullah Shafiq. A partnership of 54 runs was formed between the two and Abdullah Shafiq scored 58 runs on a total of 110 and got out lbw off the ball of Noor Ahmed.
Mohammad Rizwan looked in a hurry, after scoring 8 runs off 10 balls, he was caught out playing an unnecessary shot for a total of 120.
A partnership of 43 runs was established between Babar Azam and Saud Shakeel on the fourth wicket. Saud Shakeel was dismissed for 163 after scoring 25 runs.
On the fifth wicket, Babar Azam along with Shadab Khan took the score forward. A partnership of 43 runs was formed on this wicket as well.
Meanwhile, Babar Azam completed the 30th half-century of his career, but he was caught out by Noor Ahmed after scoring 74 runs.
A partnership of 73 runs was formed between Shadab Khan and Iftikhar Ahmed for the sixth wicket, both were caught out in the last over, both played innings of 40 and 40 runs respectively.
Pakistan scored 282 runs for the loss of 7 wickets in the allotted 50 overs.
On behalf of Afghanistan, Noor Ahmad got 3 wickets, Naveen ul Haq got 2 wickets while Azmatullah Umarzai and Mohammad Nabi got one wicket each. It should be noted that both the teams have played 4 and 4 matches in the World Cup so far, Pakistan has won 2 matches while the Afghanistan team has won 2 matches.
Both teams for the match consisted of these players:
Pakistan: Babar Azam (captain), Imam-ul-Haq, Abdullah Shafiq, Mohammad Rizwan, Saud Shakeel, Iftikhar Ahmed, Osama Mir, Shadab Khan, Hasan Ali, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Haris Rauf.
Afghanistan: Hashmatullah Shahidi (captain), Rehmanullah Garbaz, Ibrahim Zadran, Rahmat Shah, Mohammad Nabi, Ikram Ali Khel, Azmatullah Umarzai, Rashid Khan, Mujibur Rahman, Naveen ul Haq, Noor Ahmed.
