The commentary is not available for this match. Please check the scorecard for latest updates.
This has been the commentary pair of Abhishek and Bidipto, we now take your leave, but make sure to keep following Sportskeeda for more cricketing action from around the world! Bye for now, but hope to see you all very soon!
Najib Zadran, Player of the Match: I went to bat, I told Darwish that we will try to first form a partnership, then look to hit, as the game was well within our grasp, thankfully, the plan worked as we got the runs in the end. The pitch was very good to bat on indeed and the ball striking from us was clean. I would also like to share this award with Nijat Masood who had an excellent debut today!
Mohammad Nabi, Afghanistan captain: It was a really good game, both sides played well and it swung from one end to another, finally, we got the job done. There was some panic in the middle of course, but then we held our nerves and finished it off nicely. Extremely pleasing in the end for us!
Craig Ervine (Zimbabwe captain): We are happy about our performance. We are disappointed becuase we were in a winning position. I thought 150-160 was at par. We could have gone towards 170 and I believe that is where we fell short.
Afghanistan - 160/4 in 19.2 overs (Najib Zadran 44* off 25 balls, Ryan Burl 3/14 in 4 overs) beat Zimbabwe - 159/8 in 20 overs (Sikandar Raza 45 off 31 balls, Nijat Masood 3/39 in 4 overs) by 6 wickets with 4 balls to spare.
Player of the Match: Najib Zadran, who shared it with Nijat Masood
What a thrilling match this was! Afghanistan started their chase on fire, by scoring at a rate of knots without losing a wicket and looking set to get the job done as quickly as possible but then came some overs of spin, Ryan Burl's in particular, that changed the complexion of the match and turned it on its head! Three wickets, including those of Gurbaz and Hazrat, in one over, and Afghanistan were in deep trouble all of a sudden!
The runs stopped coming, the boundaries dried up and the required run rate went up to as high as 15-per-over, when Blessing Muzarabani came back to bowl his third over. And that was the over that Najib Zadran was waiting for! Right from the start, there were fours and sixes galore, and in the end of the over, there was an all-run four! The asking rate came down to less than 9-an-over!
The job was not done yet as another wicket fell, but Mohammad Nabi came out to the crease and ensured that no further damage would be done. There were eight runs left to get off the last over and the bowler was Blessing Muzarabani again, and finally, and quite befittingly, Najib Zadran hit a six off the second ball of the over to finish the match!
Zimbabwe had their moments but they introduced spin pretty late in the piece and also misfielded at important stages. And not to forget, their short and wide bowling to hard-hitting batters on a good pitch which cost them dear!
Afghanistan now go one-up with two matches to play, the first of which comes tomorrow at the same time at the same venue, so do join us for the match from the Harare Sports Club!
That is the match with the cleanest of strikes over the rope! Najib Zadran, you beauty!
19.2 Blessing Muzarabani to Najib Zadran, MAXIMUM! ZADRAN FINISHES THE GAME IN STYLE! It is a length delivery around the middle, Zadran bends a bit and hooks the delivery past the square leg boundary to get a six to his name.
Six runs needed from five balls now!
19.1 Blessing Muzarabani to Najib Zadran, full and just around off, Zadran flicks it towards long on. A fumble in the field allows Zadran a second. Pressure!
Blessing Muzarabani [3.0-0-47-0] is back into the attack.
Afghanistan have done enough to get this match done and dusted but as long as it does not end, there is no reason to relax. Zimbabwe need a tight start to the over, to put pressure on the Afghan batters. Afghanistan need to get off to a good start in the over. This is going to get really exciting now! Good thing for the batting side, Najib will be on strike!
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Harare Sports Club
