Chennai: South Africa threw a winning match as they held their nerves till the end when Pakistan’s night ended in heartbreak. They fell to the Proteas by 1 wicket. Aiden Markram starred with 91 while Shaheen Afridi picked up at 3.
“Are South Africa through to the knockout stages? Can Pakistan still qualify? Implications for CWC23 semi-finals after the thrilling PAKvSA match in Chennai”, wrote ICC on social platform X.
Pakistan has a match against Bangladesh on October 31, New Zealand on November 14, and England on November 11. Like other contenders, it lies in the bottom half of the table. In an ideal situation if Australia loses 3 of their next 4 matches, Australia will then end up with only 8 points and Pakistan will have 10 points.
The match on October 27 began with Pakistan captain Babar Azam winning the toss and being elected to bat against South Africa in their must-win World Cup clash. In the first innings, South Africa spinner Tabraiz Shamsi took 4 wickets while Saud Shakeel and Shadab Khan played a crucial partnership to help Pakistan post 270 against the Proteas on Friday.
Having lost three on the trot, Pakistan have their World Cup campaign in disarray and hopes of a semifinal qualification hanging by a thread. Babar Azam’s men have now reached that juncture where the question remains if Babar and Co. can pull off a miraculous turnaround starting Friday in the match against South Africa.
The former ODI world champions began their campaign on an impressive note with wins against Netherlands and Sri Lanka before being handed a reality check with a loss against India in another lop-sided World Cup encounter.
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