AFG vs SA highlights - Afghanistan crash against high-quality pace

They've played valiantly, and their wins over Australia and Bangladesh were two of the most memorable in the tournament. They'll be heartbroken they couldn't give a better account of themselves in the biggest match they've ever played.

But was there cause to be critical of the pitch? Ricky Ponting thinks so. He said this on air:

"It seems strange to me that you'll use a brand new wicket for a semifinal one that you've actually got no idea about how it's going to play. We heard the preparation for this wicket - it's been about a week and a half. There was a game early in the tournament - Westndies and New Zealand - which was a 150 plays 140 type game.

"And at least they had some sort of idea of how that wicket was going play. I know the ball swung that night. That's okay. You can deal with that. But the variation in bounce and seam that we've seen here, , I'm not sure if I'm the groundsman, I'll be experimenting with something like that in such a big moment."

Outside of Inda, South Africa have been the best side of this competition. They have been unbeaten, winning several close matches, finding contributions from all over their XI. And now they have rampaged into their first ever men's World Cup final, running down the target in less than nine overs, after their quicks smashed through Afghanistan's batting order.

Many South Africans will have woken up obscenely early to watch this match, but many more will be tuning in on Saturday night when they attempt to become the first team to ever win the T20 World Cup unbeaten.

This has been a dominant and clinical performance from them - not words you often associate with South Africa in the knockout stages of a World Cup.

Handy when you can wipe out more than a fifth of the target in one over. Markram got one lucky four away to fine leg off the inside part of the bat, played an outstanding cover drive next ball, then poked a three over cover point.

South Africa are more than halfway to the target. Should sail there from here.

If you've just woken up/logged in/switched on - this is the story of the match so far. South Africa were outstanding with the ball, and Afghanistan had no answers. The only South Africa bowler to miss out on a wicket was Keshav Maharaj, but then he only bowled one over, in the powerplay.

Farooqi's first over:

No matter what happens in this match, this has been a wonderful series for Farooqi, who has been one of the best swing bowlers around for a couple of years, but has had something of a breakthrough on the global stage this tournament. He's the highest wicket-taker, and bowls a wonderful series of deliveries to bowl Quinton de Kock - sending down two lovely away swingers, before sending one back in through the gate to clatter into the stumps, as de Kock tries to walk at him and bash him over mid on. QdK had hit clipped him straight of midwicket for four to start the over, so he had been watching for the inswinger too.

Naveen, next over, gets the outside edge of Aiden Markram's bat, but only Rashid has heard the nick, and they don't review. Big chance missed.

South Africa are one of two Full Member nations Afghanistan have not beaten yet, by the way.

It's the biggest match of their lives for all these players, and although they haven't lost yet, it would take a truly mesmerising bowling effort to make a game of this.

You wonder how long the regrets will linger, especially for someone like Nabi, who has played for Afghanistan since the very outset - since 2004 - but he's just been part of Afghanistan collapsing to their worst T20I score ever, in a big semi final. When will Afghanistan get the chance to play in a match like this again? Will Nabi still be part of that side?

They need early wickets here, and no one has been better at taking early wickets in this tournament than Fazalhaq Farooqi. That's the tiny sliver of hope they have to hold on to.

If you're wondering what Afghanistan's previoust lowest score was, by the way, it was 72 against Bangladesh in the 2014 T20 World Cup.

Well that was anticlimactic. Shamsi gets the last wicket, another lbw that's reviewed in desperation. And Afghanistan are shot out in the 12th over. A nightmare innings for them. Only Azmatullah Omarzai got to double figures.

We always knew their middle order was struggling, but the speed with which they folded was not expected, though South Africa's bowling was outstanding on a bowler-friendly pitch.

Nortje knocks over Rashid's off stump, as he tries to back away and fence Nortje square on the off side. Naveen-ul-Haq and Fazalhaq Farooqi are out there.

Tabraiz Shamsi's first over:

He's bowling a leg stump line, getting it to turn a little bit and rush on to the batter. And neither Karim Janat or Noor Ahmed can get bat to these balls. Both are given our lbw. They review, mostly because they have to try to save themselves.Both times it's umpire's call on impact, and they have to go.

It's now up to Rashid to get what runs he can for his team. South Africa have a small chase in their sights.

If you're wondering why Afghanistan have gone into a nosedive, some simple explanations. There is substantial seam movement off this deck, and both Rabada and Jansen have been excellent at moving the ball back in to Afghanistan's many right handers.

On top of the lateral movement, there's also plenty of bounce in this surface (Nortje just bowled a bouncer that wasn't a wide, but flew well over the outstretched glove of Quinton de Kock to run away for four byes). South Africa's quicks are a very tall bunch, and have been using that back-of-a-length nicely, as a change-up from the seaming length balls.

Maybe Afghanistan should have played more defensively than they did, and go into Test-match mode against bowling of this quality. But then they are playing a major T20 semi-final. It's a hard to expect them to have played very differently.

They are dominating this game so hard, they are barely even celebrating the wickets. This is a major semi final! Jansen gets Nangeyalia Kharote with a short ball that he gloves down the legside, to pick up his third wicket. Then first over after the powerplay ends, Omarzai toe-ends Anrich Nortje to deep cover and becomes the sixth batter to be dismissed.

Afghanistan batters are dropping so fast, it feels like they are racing each other back to the dug out. South Africa have a lot of quality in this attack, and now will hope to restrict Afghanistan to well under 100, to give themselves an easy chase.

What an over from Kagiso Rabada! A double-wicket maiden.

And who will wake Afghanistan from this nightmare? Rabada has bowled Ibrahim Zadran with is first delivery, and Mohammad Nabi with his fourth.

The Ibrahim wicket was key - Afghanistan have not really had many runs from the middle over right through this World Cup.

Later in the over, Mohammad Nabi's off stump is also out of the ground. Both times, Rabada has angled the ball in and got it to seam through the gate to hit the stumps. Where do Afghanistan go from here? South Africa haven't even brought on Nortje yet - their highest wicket-taker in the tournament before this match.

This is what Afghanistan would have feared most - losing their form batter Rahmanullah Gurbaz early. Marco Jansen bowls a lovely full delivery in the channel, gets Gurbaz driving, and the resultant edge goes to Reeza Hendricks at slip, who takes a smart catch falling to his right.

In general it's an excellent first over from Jansen:

Gurbaz had been out for a duck once before in this tournament. But that was also in the match they lost, against West Indies. They were all out for 114 chasing 219 in that game.

Gulbadin Naib, who's got a high score of 17 in the last four outings, can't make much of an impact here either. Afghanistan are two down early, as Jansen bowls a lovely angled delivery to hit the top of Naib's off stump. (Did that dodgy hamstring play up again? Hah.) Here's Jansen's second over. He's given SA exactly what they'd have wanted.

Here's Sanjay Manjrekar and Yash Jha breaking down Afghanistan's batting ahead of this match.

Fazalhaq Farooqi' swing-bowling prowess has been known for some time, but Naveen-ul-Haq has been an excellent partner for him in the early overs in this tournament. Farooqi is the World Cup's highest wicket-taker with 16 dismissals, but Naveen is not far back, with 13 of his own. They've generally been excellent at making those early breakthroughs, so the likes of Rashid can work on the middle order.

South Africa have spread their wickets around a bit more evenly. Anrich Nortje has 11 wickets, Kagiso Rabada has 10, Keshav Maharaj 9, and Tabraiz Shamsi 8. But the big wickets for them will be up the top of Afghanistan's innings - if they break the Gurbaz-Ibrahim Zadran partnership early, they will have gone some distance to upsetting Afghanistan's plans.

Some big, positive news for Afghanistan. Rahmanullah Gurbaz, their best batter of the tournament, has recovered sufficiently from a blow to the knee to be ready to play this match. That's huge for them, because they have relied on their openers to get themselves to a score their bowlers can defend.

Rashid Khan has also won the toss and chosen to bat, on a pitch that is expected not to be a batting paradise. Both these teams prefer not to chase, and Aiden Markram confirms he would have batted first as well.

The XIs are unchanged.

Both teams have not had much time to train at this venue (which is a fair way outside the Port of Spain) in the build up. But it's been especially challenging for Afghanistan, whose match ended less than 48 hours ago. They also obviously were celebrating most of the way through that night, and had arrived in Trinidad "very sleepy" as they told the ICC. Will the vibes be good enough to keep them going?

Here's a great little instagram reel from the morning after their big win.