New Delhi: The India cricket team starred both with the bat and bowl to crush Afghanistan by 66 runs on Wednesday in the Group stage match of ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2021 and keep their hopes alive of making it to the semifinals. After today's win, India's net run rate has turned from negative to positive. Chasing an uphill target of 211, Afghanistan lost early wickets and apart from a brezzy cameo from Gurbaz, none of the batters could fire.
Earlier, India were invited to bat first after Virat Kohli lost his straight 3rd toss in the T20 World Cup. Some exquisite shots were on display tonight as a calculated attack from openers Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul helped India post a mammoth 211-run target against Afghanistan - by so far the highest total by a team in T20 World Cup 2021.
Rohit Sharma scored 74 runs off 47 balls and KL Rahul scored 69 runs of 48 balls for India. For Afghanistan, Gulbadin Naib and Karim Janat took one wicket apiece.
Thanks to the record stand from the Indian openers, India had put 85/0 after the first 10 overs. Soon after in the 12th over, Rohit Sharma notched up his 23rd T20 fifty and in the very same over his opening partner KL Rahul hammered a huge six to bring up his half-century.
KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma stitched a record-breaking 140-run stand. Finishers Rishabh Pant and Hardik Pandya lensured that India did not lose momentum and kept on hitting boundaries and sixes to add 62 off just 26 between them to power their team to a 200-plus total.
India playing XI: KL Rahul, Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli (c), Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant (wk), Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Ravichandran Ashwin, Shardul Thakur, Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah
Afghanistan playing XI: Hazratullah Zazai, Mohammad Shahzad (wk), Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Mohammad Nabi (c), Najibullah Zadran, Karim Janat, Sharafuddin Ashraf, Gulbadin Naib, Rashid Khan, Naveen-ul-Haq, Hamid Hassan