New Zealand played their opening fixture of the T20 World Cup 2021 on October 26 versus Pakistan and lost by five wickets. Batting first, openers Martin Guptill and Daryl Mitchell scored 36 runs for the opening wicket. New Zealand ended up on a total of 134/8 at the end of the innings. Mitchell was the highest run-getter for the Kiwis for his knock of 27 runs from 20 balls. Guptill scored 17 runs from 20 balls but he suffered a toe injury before being sent back to the pavilion by Haris Rauf.

Rauf was the pick of the bowlers for the team as he got four wickets and gave away just 22 runs. Giving updates on the injury of Guptill, the coach of the New Zealand cricket team Gary Stead said, “We’ll see how he scrubs up overnight. He looked in a little bit of discomfort at the end of the game and it might take 24 to 48 hours to see how he goes.”

The injury comes as yet another massive blow for the Kiwis, as they have already witnessed the exit of Lockie Ferguson on Tuesday. The pacer was ruled out of the tournament after suffering a grade two calf muscle tear. New Zealand has named Adam Milne as his replacement in the squad. Stead expressed his disappointment as International Cricket Council’s (ICC) Technical Committee had not approved Adam Milne for being included in teh squad so that he couldn’t play against Pakistan.

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Gary Stead said, “We tried pretty hard today to get across the line with the ICC our replacement player, but it wasn’t to be. That was really disappointing for us because Adam Milne is someone who’s waiting in the wings as a like-for-like replacement. We’ll seek clarification on that decision of theirs.”

Defending the target of 135, New Zealand was looking in control when they took as many as five wickets for a total of 87 runs. But Shoaib Malik and Asif Ali stitched a match-winning partnership of 48 runs for the team. With the win, Pakistan is now leading the point table in their group and is most likely to make it to the semi-finals with their healthy net run rate and some easy fixtures ahead.

Sharing his views about how the group has played out so far, Stead said that Pakistan is now hot favorites to reach the semis, and the rest of the teams are fighting for second place.

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Gary Stead said, “You would imagine that Pakistan are now the hot favourites in our group to be the number one seed and the rest of us are fighting it out for the next spot, which makes the India game pretty critical.You sometimes have to lose one to find out the important things for you. If we can go and beat India then we certainly put ourselves back on the right track.”