Afghanistan’s Semi-Final Hopes Complicated After Loss to Australia

Afghanistan gave their best effort during their league match against Australia to secure two points in order to enter the semi-finals of the ICC Cricket World Cup on Tuesday at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. However, Australia pulled off an unbelievable victory with the help of one of the greatest batting displays by Glenn Maxwell, who scored an unbeaten 201 runs while chasing a competitive target of 292 runs.

Before the match, Afghanistan had a simple and clear path to enter the semi-finals, which was to beat both Australia and South Africa. But after their defeat by Australia, their chances became a bit more complex. Nevertheless, they are not yet ruled out of the semi-final race.

The Aussies were struggling at 91 for 7 before an amazing 202-run unbroken eighth-wicket partnership between Maxwell and skipper Pat Cummins took Australia home with 19 balls to spare.

Afghanistan will play their last league match against South Africa on November 10 in Ahmedabad, and they still have a chance to enter the semi-finals of the ICC Cricket World Cup with a slightly more complex calculation. Here’s how it works:

Now, they need to win against the Proteas with a significant margin to improve their net run rate and hope for the convincing defeat of both New Zealand and Pakistan in their next matches.

New Zealand will play their last match against Sri Lanka on November 9 in Bengaluru, and Pakistan will play their final league match against the defending champion England, which is in very poor form in this tournament and has already been eliminated from this World Cup, on November 11 in Kolkata.