Finally, we witnessed a balanced match featuring Pakistan in this tournament. Even though the game was for Pakistan to lose and not Afghanistan to win, we were able to catch a nerve cracking competition last night between these two neighbours. Pakistan was the rightful winner of the match, the result of the unparallel hitting by Asif Ali in the 19th over, which completely shut the game there. Let’s have a look at what went into this game yesterday.
A daring decision; justified by the captain himself
Mohammad Nabi won the toss for Afghanistan and surprisingly chose to bat; the first time a team won the toss and opted to bat first in Dubai this World Cup. The thought behind this might have been that Afghanistan has won 13 games of their previous games before this while following this trend. A risky move indeed.
And the Afghanistan batters went on to gift their wickets to Pakistani bowlers, explaining why batting first was a risky decision. Not to say Pakistani bowling was average by any means. Pakistan’s pacers had an average speed of 141kph in the Powerplay last night, which saw the first four wickets falling in the same period. Haris Rauf was mixing up slow deliveries as low as 116kph alongside five balls that were exceeding 144kph. A testament to how dangerous this bowling lineup of Pakistan is.
But amidst the quick falls came Nabi and Naib towards the death overs. Their death over hitting saw Afghanistan going over 140 total and exposed the weak link of this intimidating Pakistani bowling. Pakistan has been expensive when going full at the death so far in this World Cup. Across their games against India and New Zealand, Pakistan bowled full 39% of the time, conceding 11.72 rpo. And the Nabi-Naib duo made sure to make the most of it and gave their bowlers a good total to defend.
Afghanistan built up the pressure, but Asif nullified every other possibility.
One team that is well accustomed to these UAE conditions is Pakistan. And the second-best team was fighting them last night. The primary battle was always supposed to be between the Pakistani openers and the unpredictable Afghani bowlers. But, instead, Mohammad Rizwan departed early, and for the first ten overs, Babar Azam and Fakhar Zaman kept the crease, holding their nerves.
And still, there was no sign of Rashid Khan in those ten over. And rightfully so! It shouldn’t be a surprise to see Afghanistan backload Rashid Khan’s overs; he’s bowled just 22% of his overs inside the first ten overs of the innings in his T20I career. In came Rashid, and the game started taking shape, and at one point, the game balance was tilted in Afghanistan’s favour with 24 needed off the last two overs.
But alas! It was Asif Ali again who saw through another win for Pakistan. He finished off the game in the 19th over itself with four sixes. The lack of a quality sixth bowling option for Afghanistan put them in the worst situation, costing them the match. A simple fact that Aghanistan’s pace bowlers have conceded 9.38 rpo at the death since the last World Cup while their spinners have gone at just 7.54 rpo should give them enough material to work on.
Conclusion
Asif Ali was the clear difference between the two teams, and he was deservedly adjudged the player of the match for that breathtaking performance (25 off seven balls). So for the second game running, Pakistan has Asif Ali to express their gratitude to. And with this win, Pakistan now has 15 successive wins in UAE and three consecutive wins this world cup, sitting comfortably on top of group 2.
Afghanistan might have lost on those crucial two points, but one cannot deny that they made the Pakistani players sweat. Like Pakistan, Afghanistan, too, has an impeccable record in UAE, and who knows, we might see some upsets due to this brave nation’s exploits.