The co-hosts United States of America pulled off one of the biggest upsets in the history of T20 World Cups on Thursday, June 6. Monank Patel-led USA defeated Babar Azam's Pakistan in an absolute thrilling encounter that went into the Super Over at the Grand Prairie Stadium in Dallas. The two teams ended the normal 40-over contest tied on 159 after the USA made 11 from the last three balls of their 20-over chase.
The Americans went first in the Super Over with Aaron Jones and Harmeet Singh collecting 18 from the Super Over contest against Mohammad Amir. Only 10 of those runs came from the bat with Amir missing his line and lengths and bowling some wides.
Iftikhar Ahmed and Fakhar Zaman came to bat with the former India U19 World Cup pacer Netravalkar bowling to display his discipline. He gave only 13 runs and also got the wicket of Iftikhar as USA romped home by 5 runs in the Super Over.
A win took the hosts to the top of the points table in Group A, replacing India with four points in two matches. The USA, playing their first ICC World Cup event managed to outclass the Pakistani side in every area to mark their name in the cricketing world.
Earlier in the game, Pakistan's top order witnessed an embarrassing collapse against the USA's pace attack. In-form skipper Babar Azam and all-rounder Shadab Khan added 72 runs for the fourth wicket with the former top-scoring with 44 runs off 43 balls. Pakistan managed to rise from 66/3 in 10 overs to post a 159/7 total in 20 overs.
Nosthukosh Kennjige claimed three wickets for 30 on his return to the starting eleven while Netravalkar bagged two for 18 for the USA.
Chasing a tough target, the USA lost opener Steven Taylor early in the powerplay but captain Monak Patel and no.3 Andries Gous added a 68-run partnership for the second wicket to put USA on a track for an easy win.
But Pakistan made a stunning comeback in the death overs with greedy spells from the pace trio of Naseem Shah, Shaheen Afridi and Mohammad Amir to restrict the hosts to 159/3 in 20 overs.
However, the Super Over thriller exploited Pakistan's poor fielding efforts and leaked crucial runs which proved costly. Monak Patel bagged the Player of the Match award for top-scoring with 50 runs off 38 balls.
