England v South Africa - ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2021

The seventh edition of the ICC T20 World Cup was held in 2021 in the Middle East, across the United Arab Emirates and Oman.

Originally, this edition was meant to be held in Australia in 2020 but due to COVID-19, the event was postponed.

The ICC confirmed that the event would be hosted by India in 2021, but in June 2021 the ICC once again changed the host nation due to growing concerns over the pandemic situation in India. Thus, the UAE and Oman got the hosting rights.

The World Cup was divided into two stages, the Group stage and the Super 12s. India, along with the top nine ranked ICC Full Members qualified for the tournament directly. Out of these 10 teams, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and the six teams who qualified through the 2019 ICC T20 World Cup qualifiers were put into the Group stages.

The top 4 teams from the Group stages would qualify for the Super 12s.

Group A matches were held in the UAE and Group B matches were held in Oman. After the conclusion of the Group Stages, the Super 12s consisted of 2 groups.

Group 1: Australi, Bangladesh, England, South Africa, Sri Lanka, West Indies

Group 2: Afghanistan, India, Namibia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland

Here are the top 5 matches from the 2021 T20 World Cup.

2. Asif Ali's blitz hands Pakistan victory over Afghanistan in thriller

Two neighboring nations took part in the 24th game of the tournament, with Pakistan playing Afghanistan in Dubai on October 29.

Afghanistan won the toss and elected to bat first. After a bad start, the middle and lower-middle order of the Afghani team made sure that they scored a respectable 147/6 in their 20 overs. Mohammad Nabi and Gulbadin Naib top scored for the Afghanistan team, both scoring 35* each. Imad Wasim was the pick of the bowlers, taking 2/25. Shaheen Shah Afridi and Shadab Khan also had economical bowling spells with both having an Economy rate of 5.50 runs per over.

Pakistan's chase was kept on track by Babar Azam and Fakhar Zaman, who scored 51 and 30 runs respectively. They set the platform for Asif Ali to showcase his power-hitting skills. When Ali came to the crease, Pakistan still needed a further 26 runs off 3 overs. This became 24 runs in 2 overs when the ball was handed over to Karim Janat, who until then had decent figures of 0/24 in his three overs.

In one spectacular over, Ali hit Janat for 4 sixes and sealed the game for Pakistan. This was the one magical moment that made this match worth watching. Ali was named the player of the match.

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