Afghanistan have defeated West Indies for a successive second time in the ICC World Cup Qualifiers. The Caribbean team failed to settle scores with the Afghans as the men led by Asghar Stanikzai have become the champions in the competition.

Afghanistan have once again proved that one needs passion is the most powerful force for accomplishing anything. Otherwise, one would never expect a war-torn country giving hard time to a two-time world champion side.

Both Afghanistan and West Indies came into the final sealing the last two spots for the ICC World Cup 2019. The later had a smooth journey in the qualifiers as they advanced to the super sixes round by becoming their respective group champions. They lost only one match in the super sixes round before earning a ticket to the World Cup.
On the other hand, Afghanistan had somewhat of a nightmare start to their campaign by losing first three back to back matches in the group round to Scotland, Zimbabwe, and Hong Kong putting their chances of qualifying for the super sixes in jeopardy. However, they managed a victory over Nepal in their last group match and advanced to the final after winning all of their super sixes matches.

In the final match on Sunday, West Indies chose to bat first following the toss. Their batsmen failed to produce big innings, as a result, they got restricted to a below-par score of 204 runs.

Chris Gayle once again failed to impress with the bat and returned to the pavilion scoring only 10 runs. Following his exit, the Windies kept losing wickets at regular intervals. Rovman Powell and Shimron Hetmeyer tried to restore their innings by scoring 44 and 38 runs respectively, but the rest of the batsmen could not go past 30 runs as West Indies were all out in 46.5 overs.

Mujeeb Ur Rahman took 4 scalps and Gulbadin Naib took 2 wickets for Afghanistan. Sharafuddin Ashraf and Dawlat Zadran picked up a wicket each. Rashid Khan also got wicket to his name, making him the joint 2^nd most wicket-taker in the tournament. He is just a wicket short of Scotland’s Saafiyan Sharif who bagged 17 wickets in 7 matches.

While chasing the target, Afghanistan lost their first wicket on 58 runs as Naib left the crease scoring 14 runs. Opener Mohammad Shahzad then stitched a crucial 90-run partnership with Rahmat Shah. Both of them picked up a half-century each and were dismissed by Gayle.

Shahzad clubbed 84 runs and Rahmat made 51 runs. With these two batsmen’s departure Samiullah Shenwari and Mohammad Nabi scored 20 and 27 runs respectively to help Afghanistan cruise to victory with 7 wickets and 56 balls remaining.

Mohammad Shehzad was awarded the Man of the Match for setting up the stage for an Afghan win. Zimbabwe could not qualify for the upcoming World Cup but Sikandar Raza received the Man of the Series award for helping the side with his all-round performance.