ICC World Cup 2019, Match 28: India vs Afghanistan – Who Said What

This is exactly what you expect from a World Cup game. Both sides fighting till the end, throwing the kitchen sink at it to win the game. India had the final laugh thanks to some composed bowling towards the end from both the pacers Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Shami. However, Afghanistan made them produce a monumental effort to get over the line, something even Australia, South Africa and Pakistan couldn’t do.

Batting first, India got off to a poor start with Mujeeb removing Rohit Sharma. KL Rahul and Virat Kohli saw off the initial danger with the new ball and added 57 runs for the second wicket to put India in a commanding position. After Rahul’s dismissal, Kohli continued the good work alongside Vijay Shankar and by the end of 25 overs, they looked in a comfortable position to score in excess of 280.

The Afghan spinners picked up the pace once Vijay Shankar was dismissed by Rahmat Shah. They completely slowed down the flow of runs and Virat Kohli’s dismissal added to the Indian misery. Kedar Jadhav registered a much-needed fifty against a strong bowling side. His exploits helped India garner a respectable 224 runs on the board. Their spinners collectively bowled 34 overs, giving away just 119 runs and also picked up five wickets.

Nabi takes it to the final delivery

Hazratullah Zazai’s stumps were rattled very early in the innings, but Rahmat Shah showed some character against the Indian new ball bowlers. After adding 44 runs with Gulbadin Naib, he stitched a 42-run partnership with Hashmatullah Shahidi and it seemed like Afghanistan had gained some control. But Virat Kohli‘s masterstroke to bring back Jasprit Bumrah in the middle overs opened the game up big time as he dismissed both the set batsmen in the same over.

Mohammad Nabi took control of the innings later on and almost produced a massive scare. His partnership with Najibullah Zadran threatened to take the game away, but Hardik Pandya provided a crucial breakthrough to keep India alive. Nabi completed his half-century and took the game to the final over, but Shami had the last laugh, who picked up a sensational hat-trick to finish off the game and helped India register an 11-run win.

Also read- ICC World Cup 2019: Match 28, IND vs AFG – India Player Ratings

Man of the Match, Jasprit Bumrah said:

That gives you a lot of confidence if the captain has so much of trust in you, that gives you a lot of confidence to trust yourself and clear my head in terms of how I want to execute. We saw that wicket was getting slower and slower with the older ball, you need to be more accurate and bowl stump to stump. This is a big ground and there was reverse swing, but you need to rely on your yorkers as well and play according to the situation.

It was a tight game and I backed my skills. Sometimes when you run behind wickets, you don’t get wickets. We wanted to create pressure and take the run rate high. As soon as the required rate gets high, you get wickets. Gives us healthy competition in the side and we (bowlers) all discuss as what to do and how things are going. It’s a good sign when everyone is chipping in with the wickets.

Winning captain Virat Kohli said:

It’s (the win) right up there to be honest. We have been playing some good cricket and you expect yourself to win the toss and put big runs on the board and then you see the pitch being slow with three quality spinners in the opposition, I felt 270 should have been ideal and thought 250 would have been par. A team like Afghanistan who has a lot of talent doesn’t let you play the way you want to play.

Everyone had collective belief that we can win this one. As soon as I went in I understood the pace of this pitch, cross batted shots are not easy on this pitch and you gotta play with a straight bat. I was able to rotate strike and our shot selection could have been much better and I think a lot of horizontal bat shots cost us wickets.

I figured out that playing with the straight bat is the only way you can get runs on this pitch, you can’t really take the game away from the opposition and you gotta respect the conditions to knock the ball around for ones and twos and once you lose wickets then on a pitch like that with three quality wrist spinners, it’s always going to be tough and I thought Nabi bowed outstandingly also. They really put pressure on us in the middle overs and as I said our shot selection could have been a lot better.

Its simple we wanted to use him (Bumrah) smartly when the conditions allow him to. He gets a longer spell and because he can pick wickets in the spell he can get you quick wickets. He is the bowler who can do the damage at any stage of the innings and the opposition knows that as well. The communication was to finish him off at 49th over so that Shami has enough runs to defend in the last over and yeah the plan worked really well today.

Keeping Chahal back also worked. All in all, the bowling performance was outstanding. Everyone’s waiting for an opportunity and I think Shami was really good today and especially his first spell, he was making the ball do more than anyone else today. Vijay Shankar has come in and he showed intent and he is fielding really well. It’s an honour for everyone to represent their country in the World Cup.

This game was way more important to be honest as I said it didn’t go as plan. But when things don’t go your way, you need to show some character and bounce back and fight till the last ball and that shows the character of the team. We take a lot of heart from this win and take the confidence going forward.

The losing captain Gubladin Naib said:

We played really well in the first innings. The bowlers bowled really well. We know India have a strong batting line-up. Bumrah was superb at the death – in the last two, three overs. Spinners bowled according to the plan. Rashid, Mujeeb, Rahmat.. Everyone bowled well. In the end it was a good game. The total was not big, but we needed someone to make 80. 30s are not enough to cross the line. We lost badly in the first half of the tournament, but we have played some good cricket in the second half and I am happy with the way the team has performed.