Australia’s T20 World Cup dream has ended after Afghanistan defeated Bangladesh to secure the last semi final spot at the tournament.
Following a low-scoring total of 5-115 from Afghanistan, who elected to bat first after wining the toss, the Aussies relied on a Bangladesh victory to qualify for the final-four.
Unfortunately for Australia, a brave knock from opener Liton Das was all in vain as the Tigers fell agonisingly short of pulling off the upset, allowing Afghanistan to advance.
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The rain-affected match was marred by controversy during Bangladesh’s innings, when Gulbadin Naib seemingly faked a hamstring injury to force a rain delay after coach Johnathan Trott signalled for his team to slow down.
“Oh no, sorry, you can’t have this – I’m not accepting that,” Simon Doull said on commentary.
“Even Rashid (Khan) doesn’t like it. It’s just delay tactics. I get it but I don’t like that at all.
“It is unacceptable. They might have gone off anyway for the rain but that’s not a good look. I know the Euros are going on in football, you’d be better off there.”
The tactics drew the ire of plenty on social media, but Indian star Ravichandran Ashwin found the funny side of the Naib incident.
https://twitter.com/imransiddique89/status/1805457736055873825?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfwhttps://twitter.com/ashwinravi99/status/1805457023548444696?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfwhttps://twitter.com/ScottBaileyAAP/status/1805457694406721837?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
In an interview with Wide World Of Sports, former Test captain Mark Taylor admitted there was a fine line when it came to allegations of cheating after the incident.
”I saw the potential shenanigans where people were pretending to be injured and all sorts of stuff,” he said.
“I haven’t seen anything like that, not that I can think of.
“It’s not a good look at the end of the day, you don’t want to see that sort of stuff. What is cheating? Where do you draw the line with cheating?
“The administrators write laws for the playing conditions and you can bet that players are going to try and go as close to that line as they can, without going over it.”
Bangladesh lost their final wicket with seven balls remaining in their innings, with Das finishing unbeaten on 54 but ran out of partners as Afghanistan held on by seven runs.
Speaking after the dramatic clash, Naveen Ul-Haq praised his side for staying patient in tricky conditions as they reach the business-end of the tournament.
“We have worked so hard over the past couple of years and we were dreaming and we were waiting for this day,” he said.
“I’m lost for words. It is such a surreal experience.I think we always knew that they [Bangladesh] were going hard in the power play. We knew we could stay in the game as long as we picked up simple wickets.
“I think these are the games you never know what could happen.We had confidence that these wickets weren’t high scoring wickets.”
A 15-run final over headed by Khan took Afghanistan from 5-100 to 5-115, with the star bowler finishing the innings with a 98-metre six in a bid to keep their hopes alive.
The Afghanistan skipper’s injection was explosive in more ways than one as he became the centre of an ugly incident outside the crease.
In what seemingly was a communication error, Khan attempted to send a helicopter shot off Tanzim Hasan Sakib into the boundary but the ball fell short.
The 25-year-old opted to take advantage of increased pressure on the Bangladesh fielders and turned for a second run, however, batting partner Karim Janat elected to stay put.
Khan fired his bat towards Janat after he refused a second run that would have seen the BBL star back on the strike.
“He wants two and he’s furious – he’s thrown his bat,” New Zealand cricket great Ian Smith declared in commentary on Amazon Prime.
“I’ve never seen that before in any cricket. He’s so cross and he’s turned his back.”
Earlier, Bangladesh came out firing, bowling seven dot balls in the first two overs to limit Afghanistan to -5.
Afghan star batting duo Rahmanullah Gurbaz and Ibrahim Zadran reclaimed control of the game, playing a 59-run partnership before Zadran was court for 18.
A three-wicket haul by Rishad Hossain kept Bangladesh’s World Cup campaign alive, with the score standing at 4-89 with three overs to go.