Team India finally went for a win in the third match against Afghanistan. The Indian bowlers took wickets at regular and finished the game at 144/7. They gave batters of the opponent team a very hard time to score runs. India not only tasted their first major victory but at the same time improved their NRR to +0.073. Openers Rohit Sharma and KL Rahul had a fantastic partnership of 140 runs. The former one made 74 runs and the latter one made 69 which helped the team cross the 200 mark.
Match report : India vs Afghanistan
India registered 210/2 in 20 overs after being asked to bat by Afghanistan. Afghanistan bowlers attacked well for three overs. KL Rahul hit a few boundaries and helped India post 85/0. KL Rahul scored a half-century for the team. The Indian openers added 140 runs for the first wicket and set a new record for India in T20Is. Sharma had to return to the pavilion at 74 since he got dismissed by Karim Janat. Rahul got out on 69 by Gulbadin Naib. Hardik Pandya and Rishabh Pant had good contributions to the team. They score 35 runs and 27 runs respectively.
Afghanistan lost wickets at an early stage. Jasprit Bumrah got Zazai’s wicket who made 13 runs. Mohammed Shami got the wicket of Mohammad Shahzad without giving a single run. Afghani players, Gurbaz and Gulbadin took the team to 47/2 after the powerplay. Soon after, Gurbaz got removed by Ravindra Jadeja scoring only 19. A lot of expectations were from Gulbadin but he got out by R Ashwin(LBW). Afghanistan made 61-4 after 10 overs. R Ashwin cleaned up Najib as Afghanistan reached 98/5 after 16 overs. Slowly, Mohammed Shami got two more wickets and finished the game at just 144 runs.
Rohit Sharma received the title of “Player of the match”. The Men in Blue finally won their first match in the tournament and kept the hopes for the semifinals alive.
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