The ICC World Cup 2023 has entered a thrilling stage after Afghanistan and the Netherlands recorded two of the biggest upsets of this mega event after beating England and South Africa respectively, and the Afghans are once again gearing up to do another upset and take New Zealand down at the M.A. Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai, India on Wednesday.
Afghanistan are in high spirits after recording their second win in World Cup history and are ready to create further history by beating another tournament’s favourite in New Zealand. The Afghans will surely count on Rahmanullah Gurbaz, who was their top performer with the bat against the mighty England, to deliver for his side once again.
On the other hand, New Zealand, along with India, is the only team in the World Cup to win all of their matches. The Kiwis are in red-hot form but two of their wins came against relatively weaker sides, the Netherlands and Bangladesh, as compared to the other big teams. Despite that, the Black Caps have been performing as a unit, dominating their opponents in all aspects of the game.
It will be interesting to see how the Kiwis — who will be playing without their skipper, Kane Williamson as he injured his thumb during his side's win against Bangladesh — tackle the unstoppable spin attack of Afghanistan on the tricky and spinning-friendly wicket of Chennai but Hashmatullah Shahidi’s men can be troubled to an extent by Mitchell Santner, who is the joint top-wicket taker in the World Cup alongside Jasprit Bumrah and Matt Henry.
Pitch report
The surface in Chennai favours spinners generally and has a few of the most spin-friendly wickets in India. In the first World Cup contest at this venue, which was played between India and Australia, the wicket favoured spinners. However, in the second game between New Zealand and Bangladesh, the pitch assisted pacers as well. The toss-winning captain would opt to bowl first as the ball turns during the day and makes it difficult for the team to bowl second because of dew, which comes later and helps the batters.
Head-to-Head record
The two sides have never played each other in the ICC World Cup. However, they have only played twice in the 50-over format with the Black Caps emerging winners twice.
Probable Playing XIs
Afghanistan: Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Ibrahim Zadran, Rahmat Shah, Hashmatullah Shahidi (c), Ikram Alikhil (wk), Mohammad Nabi, Azmatullah Omarzai, Rashid Khan, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Naveen-ul-Haq, Fazalhaq Farooqi
New Zealand: Devon Conway, Will Young, Rachin Ravindra, Daryl Mitchell, Tom Latham (c, wk), Glenn Phillips, Mark Chapman, Mitchell Santner, Matt Henry, Lockie Ferguson, Trent Boult
