By Brian Thomas
As the evening shadows deepened, in Dubai , the Pakistanis faulted , with a catching flaw , and the Australians , with Mathew Wade made it count to win by 5 wickets and an over to spare to join New Zealand for the finals of T 20 World Cup 2021.
Aaron Finch, put Pakistan into bat , and the men in green , did well to score 176 for 4 wickets in their alloted 20 overs.
Mohd Rizwan and Babar Azam, got the Pakistanis to a great start , and they reached 47 for no loss in the power play overs.
Babar Azam , batting on 39 , and looking composed, draged a leg spin from outside the off stump, and was caught by David Warner at deep long on , with the score on 71.
Fakhar Zaman , who joined Mohd Rizwan, came to his own , and the pair stiched a 71 run partnership for the second wicket.
A tired Rizwan ultimately gave into his fatigue to be caught by Steven Smith off Mitchel Stach at the cow corner for yet another impressive 69.
Zaman hung in at the Wickets to guide his team with an explosive 55 , and Pakistan ended with defendable total of 176 for 4 wickets.
The Aussies got off to a horror start as skipper Aaron Finch was stuck by a Sameen Afridi late inswing , wrapped right in front of the stumps for a duck , and walked back to the dug out with just one run on the board.
Sensible batting by Mitch Marsh and David Warner too the winners to 56 for 2 wickets , with Marsh giving Shadab Khan his first of the 4 scalps , as he was brilliantly caught in the deep by Asif Ali for 28.
Steve Smith, got agricultural in his execution to Shadab Khan off spiner , to give the willy spinner his second wicket almost back to back , and the Australians looked buried on 77 for 3.
David Warner, the inform batter at the wickets, had a appalling dismissal. Their was daylight beween bat and ball , as he tried to slap at a delivery from out side his off stump off Shadab Khan , a creeky noice off his bat , gave an incorrect signal to the umpire , who ruled him out caught behind, with the Australians in deep trouble on 89 for 4. Warner should have reviewed the decision. So dont blame the fielders for the appeal ir the Umpire.
Maxwell has had an awful world cup so far. He has not bothered the scorers in this years version.
The right hander known for his improvisation, tried a reverse sweep off Shadab, and was brilliantly caught at mid wicket by Harris Rauf for 7 runs , and the Australians were lpoking at defeat on 96 runs for 5 Wickets.
Mathew Wade joined Marcus Stonis, the last recognised batting pair for the Australians.
The right hand left hand combination, started to blossom. The Pakistanis were guilty of bowling length deliveries, and were cartered to all parts of the park after the 15th over.
Add fuel to the fire , Hassan Ali missed a catch off man of the match Mathew Wade, who stuck 3 sixes in the 18th over of Shaeen Afridi, and got the job done for the mighty Aussies.
Stonis remaind unbeaten on 40 , whilst Mathew Wade an unbeaten 41 off just 17 deliveries, was an exquisite, well planned execution of the highest order to see them through to tge finals
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