No India . No Asian Team. No Tickets crisis. Still 40000 plus spectators. Best century from NZ batter in 33balls. Chockers South Africa. But unknown Kolkata at night!

By Rahul Das

The beauty of a tantalizing semifinal and watching it from the privileges of a corporate box got evaporated swiftly in the mild heat of early summer in Kolkata. I had decided not to take my car As I didn’t get any car sticker – again a surprise for me. The game got over at 10 PM much before schedule and I left immediately not waiting for post-match presentation.

I had to Helter skelter with my heavy body to the nearest Metro Station which is Park Street – I was told that last metro leaves at 10.40. When I reached PS Metro it was 10.37 – took me almost 30 mins from the Club House Lower tier to reach PS Metro. But reaching it I WAS disappointed to see that although the gates were open the services were disrupted and there was no metro either side. I had to wait for some time to understand whether it was working or not but it didn’t.

I had to come up all the way and avail UBER services dead of night which cost me a fortune. That’s another story but very disappointing to say that when a match of such magnitude happens in Kolkata essential services like the Metro must operate whole night. I don’t know whether they did or what they did but I was the sufferer and many like me suffered.

On the match front, it was a surprise complete annihilation by the Kiwis. Allen spearheaded New Zealand’s extraordinary chase at Eden Gardens, where the brutalised South Africa taking just fewer than 13 overs to reach their 170-run target. South Africa went into the match unbeaten, including registering a win over New Zealand in the group stage of the competition.

However, their hopes of qualifying for this weekend’s final quickly unravelled in the face of a huge opening stand from Allen and Tim Seifert.The pair hit 84 runs between them in the power play, in which Corbin Bosch was hit for five consecutive boundaries by Allen in the sixth over of the innings.

Seifert reached his half-century first, taking 28 balls to reach the milestone with a four off Lungi Ngidi to get there. Allen joined him in the following over, recording a 19-ball 50 – the joint fastest so far at the 2026 T20 World CuSeifert fell off the first ball of the 10th over, but with New Zealand already needing less than a run a ball, the damage was mostly done. That didn’t stop Allen from continuing to motor and, going into the 13th over of the chase with New Zealand needing 21 runs to win, he went up another gear.

He hit two fours off the first two balls before hitting back-to-back sixes off the next two. That brought the scores level with Allen four runs short of 100. He got both jobs done on the next ball by flaying a four over mid-off off Marco Jansen, winning the match and completing an extraordinary hundred in one