Not an upset: Afghanistan's burdened men triumph on Australia's machine

Australia threw everything at Afghanistan. They threw a Pat Cummins hat-trick in the first innings, only the second instance of back-to-back international hat-tricks in history. They threw another Glenn Maxwell masterclass, an even rarer inexplicably identical turn-up against the same team after his all-timer in the 2023 ODI World Cup.

They made lightning strike twice. At the same spot. And then did it again in the second innings. And Afghanistan still came on top.

Not only did Rashid Khan's team defend a total as bang average as 148, but they also bowled Australia out in 19.2 overs, just for a statement's sake. Just to have the satisfaction of putting them out of their misery. Just to announce to those still living under a rock that this is not an upset.

Upsets often have one or two defining moments, which feature writers and pundits love to point out. Some big star dropping a catch, a bad run-out, and so on. This one didn't. It had multiple moments of an underdog side brimming with combustible passion, seeing every Afghan player playing with a face part poker and part angry.

You could see that in Rashid when catches were dropped and run-out chances were missed - Afghanistan conceded 16 extras too. Although some of them weren't even half chances, an urgency in the group was palpable.

Perhaps it was because their ruining of a winning position at the Wankhede last year was still a fresh memory. And, perhaps, like it was on that night too, the sense of injustice at Australia rejecting to play bilaterals against them was still itchy.

But perhaps that's what you need to beat Australia and their machine carefully calibrated not to win matches but entire tournaments again and again. You need to be as human as possible.

The Aussies would have felt every big moment in their robotic, pressure-averse hearts. Travis Head's bowled to a peach (despite the bowler wearing a blue shirt) and the quiet celebrations would have sent shimmers down some spines.

Rahmanullah Gurbaz took a great catch off Marcus Stoinis' top edge after avoiding two collisions. His leap of joy would have painted a stunning polarity to the Australian finisher - who has been the best in the role this World Cup - walking off confused as to how he did that to a 122 kph slower one in Gulbadin Naib's first over of the game.

Similarly, the stunner that wrist spinner Noor Ahmad took at short third to get Maxwell can't be explained in cricketing terms. In how many Artificial Intelligence-run emotionless simulations does Noor take that catch? In how many does Naib bowl a breathless 4/20 after hardly bowling in previous games?

Afghanistan's tactical triumph over Australia

Emotions and historical moments of passion were there in 2023 too. Naveen ul Haq had gotten rid of Travis Head and Mitchell Marsh early on that fateful night as well. But Afghanistan had fallen short that night tactically for they had let their emotions give way to a miracle for the opposition.

This time, they were better and more mature. First-innings batting has been difficult this year due to the constantly changing conditions, which makes it hard to guess a winning total. Afghanistan zeroed in on 150 and they reached their no matter how ugly it looked.

It meant curbing openers Gurbaz and Ibrahim Zadran's natural boundary-hitting game and putting the entire focus on the running between the wickets. Together, they scored 47 non-boundary runs. The entire Australian side combined to score 53.

Their partnership almost overstayed its welcome, allowing Cummins to affect a final third collapse. However, by that time, Afghanistan's reading of the pitch had proven to be better than Australia's.

"I thought they batted well," Cummins said in the mid-innings break. "But I also thought we restricted the boundaries. They obviously ran well but it was overall a decent bowling effort... It's not the flattest wicket in the world, but also not a terrible wicket - there's runs to be scored out there."

Australia had the runs to score but they didn't look like they knew how. The strategy of going bang-bang in the powerplay versus the swinging new ball proved to be a poor, inconceivable one.

And then Afghanistan compensated for their batting shortcomings with a once-in-a-lifetime bowling show. Unlike Australia, they kept pace on for as long as they could at the start of the innings, despite having a much better spin attack. And Naveen, Fazalhaq Farooqi, and Azmatullah Omarzai kept attacking the stumps like it's required in the West Indies, unlike Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood.

An Afghanistan team of old (for whom this would have been an upset) wouldn't have waited for the final over of the powerplay to bring Mohammad Nabi, nor brought Naib on in the middle of Rashid and Noor spells by understanding that spin was only feeding Maxwell and Stoinis' attempt to rebuild.

They showed courage to trust eight bowlers, delicately working with match-ups, which made bowling consultant DJ Bravo offer fist pumps on the sidelines. And when Maxwell eventually got out to Naib, the emotions took over from tactics again, to see them blow off the tail with steam, culminating in celebrations that said it was the peak of Afghan cricket.

It was the first loss for Australia against Afghanistan in internationals. They perhaps didn't expect to face strategic superiority like this when they won the toss and elected to bowl first, despite the history of the ground begging them to do otherwise.

As they have been pushed close to a Super-Eights exit, a thought goes to the women cricketers of Afghanistan, who Cricket Australia (CA) rightly raised its voice for. Had it not been for a regressive government, they would probably have had a moment or two like this of their own by now.

But, at the same time, you can't help but see it as a vindication for the men's team, who also rightly pointed out to CA's cant in refusing to spend on mostly inconsequential bilaterals while acquiring a studied silence ahead of World Cup clashes.

Had they pretended to understand that just giving up bilaterals can't be the way to solve this complicated issue and instead used those games as a platform to create awareness, they might have also gained more experience against this excellent T20 team, at least enough to know that they are not just emotions and luck.