Tense Diwali For Team India: How Can They Qualify For T20 World Cup Semifinals?

Dubai: The festival of lights is meant to spread cheer, especially in COVID-ravaged times. For Team India cricketers, however, Diwali 2021 is enveloped in tension and uncertainty.

Virat Kohli and his teammates, in the midst of a difficult T20 World Cup campaign, spent the day preparing for Friday’s match against Namibia.

Under normal circumstances, Indian players should have been in a relaxed mood on the eve their clash against one of the weaker teams in the tournament. But despite having thrashed potentially tricky opponents Afghanistan by 66 runs a day earlier, the Men in Blue stare at an early and unexpected exit.

Heavy defeats against Pakistan and New Zealand in their first two games pushed India to the edge. With two teams advancing to the semifinals from the six-team group and Pakistan having already ensured progress, India are no longer in control of their destiny, and have been left depending on other team’s results.

India need a miracle from here onwards to avoid being knocked out from the group stage in what is Virat Kohli’s last outing as T20 International skipper of the national team.

Here’s how India can make it to the semifinals:

* India can at best finish with 6 points by beating Namibia and Scotland

* New Zealand must lose to either Namibia (on November 5) or Afghanistan (November 8) to ensure a tie with India

* Afghanistan are more likely to cause an upset; if they beat New Zealand, three teams – India, NZ & Afghanistan – will finish with 6 points each and net run rate (NRR) will come into play

* India is the worst-placed currently among the three teams on net run rate; Afghanistan’s NRR is 1.48, New Zealand’s NRR is 0.816 and India’s NRR is 0.073. Hence, to edge out Afghanistan and NZ, India will have to win their last 2 games by massive margins

* All equations will go for a toss if New Zealand beat Namibia and Afghanistan because then they will finish with 8 points (more than India & Afghans).