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Sunday, November 14, 2021

Australia's batting vs New Zealand's bowling

Cricket is a funny as well as cruel game, because tomorrow there are two teams going to play where one of the cricketer from NZ team claimed he wished he wasn't a cricketer the way NZ lost the game in 2019 CWC.

Australia and NZ would be finishing the game on Monday 15 November 2021

Because As per Australia East Coast Time, game would be starting their 1 am and similarly 3 am as per NZ timezone.

Regular ICC tournaments

No matter how crushing a defeat, it is not the end of the world in today's cricket where World Cups of one format or the other are played practically every year. Hasan Ali, Chris Jordan, we are looking at you. You dust yourselves up, start to play good cricket again and, with some luck, you get that chance again. Especially in T20 cricket, prone to upsets and chance because of the crunched nature of it.

NZ and Australia way through to the finals

Finishing second in their groups, they got the better of the tournament favorites in the semi-finals through a dash in the final four overs, helped significantly by the toss.

A tournament defined by toss

Winning the toss and win the match have been the mantra of this tournament, as this has been the friendliest of all T20 World Cups to sides winning the toss: if the final is also won by the side winning the toss, two out of every three matches will have been won by the toss-winners.
Restrict it to evenly matched teams and take out Sharjah, and only one total has been defended out of 14 in the Super 12s. They don't come more evenly matched than these two. If Australia have the extra batting depth, New Zealand have a more rounded bowling attack, the most economical of the tournament. Usually batting depth trumps rounded attacks in T20 contests, but this has been the slowest-scoring T20 World Cup of all, which gives bowling-heavy teams a chance.
Then again, the final will be played on a fresh pitch; if it is anything like the semi-final in Dubai, it gives Australia a slight advantage, but if 150-160 is a par score, New Zealand might just be the favorites.

Form guide

This is to confirm that following form guide is according to last five completed matches, and having the most recent first

Australia         W - W - W - - W
New Zealand  W - W - W - W - W

Players to look out for

David Warner - AUSTRALIA

Scan the teams for a player worthy of a place in an all-time T20 XI, and your eyes might land on David Warner. Like Langer and a few other Australia players, Warner has had a pretty ordinary year though. He made a premature comeback from injury in the series loss against India, and spent large parts of the IPL coming to terms with the ignominy of not even making his IPL team's XV leave alone an all-time XI.

Tim Southee - NEW ZEALAND

Tim Southee has taken at least one wicket in each match and has gone at just 5.75 runs an over so far. Fourteen of his 24 overs have been bowled in the power-play period, and five overs at the death-overs. Here is a bowler who didn't even get to play in the first XI in his team's last World Cup, therefore the turnaround has been remarkable, and just like a well-constructed T20 over, he needs to close it out in the final moments.

Team Probable

Australia (probable) 
1 David Warner, 
2 Aaron Finch (capt.), 
3 Mitchell Marsh, 
4 Steven Smith, 
5 Glenn Maxwell, 
6 Marcus Stoinis, 
7 Matthew Wade (wk), 
8 Pat Cummins, 
9 Mitchell Starc, 
10 Adam Zampa, 
11 Josh Hazlewood
 
New Zealand (probable) 
1 Martin Guptill, 
2 Daryll Mitchell, 
3 Kane Williamson, 
4 Tim Seifert (wk), 
5 Glenn Phillips, 
6 James Neesham, 
7 Mitchell Santner, 
8 Tim Southee, 
9 Adam Milne, 
10 Trent Boult, 
11 Ish Sodhi
 

Pitch and conditions

A fresh pitch good for batting although there haven't been much dew here-and-there but still chasing the total would be preferred. 

Statistics

  • New Zealand have never beaten Australia in any knockout match. They have played each in 17 quarter-finals, semi-finals and finals, out of which Australia have won 16. The one that New Zealand won wasn't a knockout but the first of the best-of-five finals in 1981, a series that New Zealand eventually lost. Australia have won all the four knockout matches between them at ICC events. 
  • Neither captain is having a great tournament. Kane Williamson has scored 131 runs at under a run a ball, and Aaron Finch has scored at a rate of just 119 despite being an opener and getting to bat in the powerplay. Finch, though, has done much better at the toss, winning five to Williamson's two.
  • It is guaranteed to have a first T20 world champion from the southern hemisphere.
  • "It's not unexpected: we came here with a clear plan to try and win this tournament and always felt as though we had the depth and quality in our squad to put ourselves in a position to do that, and New Zealand have been in every final for a long time now in ICC events. They're a great team over all three formats and can never be underestimated, but maybe people on the outside do."
    Aaron Finch objects to the suggestion that Australia vs New Zealand is an "unexpected" final
  • "I suppose the fact that we're neighbors creates a bit of that [rivalry]. And [in] a number of different sports as well. We play each other on a number of occasions. It's always a great competition and great occasion when we play each other."
    Kane Williamson on the Trans-Tasman rivalry

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