Our online cricket betting analysis and New Zealand vs Afghanistan betting predictions are coming up next so keep on reading because all will be revealed ahead of this important match at the World Cup.
Can Afghanistan cause a huge upset at big odds against the highly impressive New Zealand? Probably not but if they’re competitive, that will provide us with a good betting opportunity.
The match will take place at the MCG in Melbourne on Wednesday, October 26 at 1:30 IST and should be a good one, so keep on reading.
Up next are our cricket betting tips for this match and on this occasion, we’re going to go with our tried-and-trusted strategy of backing the favourite at bigger odds than what they are to begin with, thanks to Live Betting.
Afghanistan are yet to win a big game at a World Cup and that’s unlikely to change here.
But a good start from them bowling first can put New Zealand under some pressure and if the Black Caps reach 1.5 in Live Betting, back them.
If they don’t, then don’t back them and save your money for another day!
Recommended Bet: Back New Zealand @ 1.5 in Live Betting with Blue Chip.
New Zealand are 1.19 with Afghanistan 4.7.
This looks pretty straightforward, right?
New Zealand are fresh from absolutely hammering the tournament favourites Australia and look the team to beat.
Afghanistan have just lost to England in a game where their batting really let them down.
When they played last year, the Black Caps won pretty easily, with Afghanistan’s batsmen letting the side down once again.
But there are reasons to think that this could be a lot closer than the pre-match odds suggest.
But only if the Afghans get to chase.
That’s where their strength lies.
New Zealand can be a little ponderous at times batting first with Williamson the chief culprit in that and if they get to about 155 batting first across the full 20 overs, Afghanistan could well come very close to chasing that.
Close but maybe not close enough.
So we’ll hope that Afghanistan field first, that they make early inroads and that they shorten in price.
Which of course means that New Zealand lengthen in price before going on to flex their muscles and justify their favouritism.
It’s also with remembering that even though Rashid Khan and co have come pretty close to winning a big game at a World Cup, they haven’t actually done it against one of the big boys.
And this is unlikely to be the match where that changes against such organised opposition.
If Afghanistan field first and New Zealand drift to about 1.5 in live Betting, that will provide a good betting opportunity.
And if you haven’t read it already, here’s our BlueChip review.
But what they wouldn’t have expected was to get just about every single aspect of their game plan right.
Finn Allen was looking to be aggressive from the start and that’s exactly what he did.
His 41 from just 16 balls was what really got their innings going and it was that early pressure on Australia that the hosts never recovered from.
In some ways his innings was even more important than the excellent one played by Devon Conway.
Conway was both aggressive and controlled in his unbeaten 92 off 58, the best knock of the tournament so far alongside that of Virat Kohli against Pakistan.
And if he carries on in this sort of form, he’s a contender for Player of the Tournament.
But if they did the business with the bat to get to a score of 200/3, they also followed it up with a fine bowling performance.
There may have been a few grumbles about New Zealand picking Mitchell Santner rather than the in-form Michael Bracewell but for the time being at least, Santner more than justified his selection.
He took 3-31 and adapted beautifully to the conditions on the day.
Another man who took three wickets was Tim Southee.
Remarkably, he needed just 2.1 overs to do so (because Australia were all out before he could complete his quota) and even more remarkably, two of those wickets were of dangermen David Warner and Mitch Marsh.
So it was a remarkable all-round performance and you can see why New Zealand’s odds to win the World Cup have halved as a result of that excellent win that not only gave them two points but also an extremely strong net run rate.
Many will feel that such an organised, disciplined and hard-working side could be the team to beat at this World Cup.
Daryl Mitchell continues to recover from a hand injury and given their start to the campaign and that this isn’t (on paper) one of their hardest matches, they may give him a few more days to recover.
That would mean Mark Chapman keeping his place for the time being.
How Afghanistan wished they had somehow managed to muster 15-20 more runs against England on Saturday.
That 112 looked a really poor effort at first but given what a meal England made of chasing it and you can see how those extra runs could have put England under some serious pressure.
But then again, we all know that it’s Afghanistan’s batting that is their Achilles heel and their bowling that is their real strength.
So maybe it shouldn’t have come as too much of a surprise.
Yes, conditions weren’t so easy on the day and Sam Curran with five wickets was outstanding for England.
But still.
Only two players boasted a strike rate of over 100 and the top scorer was Ibrahim Zadran with just 32.
They were far better with the ball, though.
Four players had an economy rate of 6 or under and they claimed five England wickets between them, despite the low total that they were chasing.
As ever, Mujeeb Ur Rahman and Rashid Khan were particularly good.
They look a side far more suited to chasing than batting first so they’ll be hoping they have the chance to do that here.
Likely XI
Zazai, Gurbaz, I Zadran, Ghani, N Zadran, Nabi, Omarzai, Khan, Mujeeb, Ahmad, Farooqi.
New Zealand vs Afghanistan Head-to-Head
These two have played each other just once.
It was last year at the World Cup in the UAE and New Zealand won comfortably.
Chasing just 125 after Trent Boult had taken three wickets, they got home with almost two overs to spare thanks to a typical Kane Williamson innings of 40 off 42.
Venue & conditions
We’re at the MCG for this one and it will be just the third match of the tournament played there after India vs Pakistan on Sunday and England vs Ireland, which will take place earlier on in the day.
160 is roughly the par score here and if Afghanistan can restrict New Zealand to that, they’ll have a decent chance in the chase because they’re much better suited to chasing.
But there’s about a 70% chance that we’ll have some rain here during the match.
If there is and it’s reduced in overs, that will play into Afghanistan’s hands and an upset could be on the cards.
