South Africa or Afghanistan set to create history with first ever T20 WC final appearance
Cricket World Cup across both white-ball formats will be up for grabs for South Africa and rising Asian side Afghanistan in the first semifinal of the ICC T20 World Cup 2024 at Tarouba, Trinidad and Tobago on Thursday.
Afghanistan's progression to the semi-finals of the World Cup has been a remarkable and wholesome story for a team who have been on the rise in this format for some time, with New Zealand and multi-time world conquerers Australia the highest-ranked teams facing the Afghan storm.
Unbeaten South Africa stands in their way, with the nation hoping it is eighth-time lucky at a men's World Cup semi-final across formats, having lost all seven semifinals it has played so far, as per ICC.
With a powerful batting line-up that possesses attacking weapons right down to number seven and a bowling attack that has pace and guile alike, South Africa will have confidence that 2024 will finally be their year.
The Brian Lara Cricket Academy in Tarouba is a 15,000-capacity ground that is hosting its fifth and final match of the tournament.
All four previous matches came in Group C during the first group stage, where runs proved reasonably hard to come by. West Indies' 149/9 against New Zealand was the highest total at the venue across the four fixtures.
South Africa has a perfect record at the tournament, but has been pushed close a number of times across their seven matches.
Netherlands, Bangladesh and Nepal could and maybe should have beaten the Proteas during the group stage. before tournament co-hosts USA gave
