T20 World Cup 2024 Group Stage Combined Best Playing 11

T20 World Cup 2024 Combined Best Playing 11 for Group Stage

June 21, 2024 Abhay Kothari Australia Cricket Team, Cricgasm, Cricket, Cricket News, Hardik Pandya, India Cricket Team, T20 Cricket, T20 World Cup, Team India 5 min read

Hardik Pandya, the only Indian player as we look at the combined best playing 11 for T20 World Cup 2024.

‘Ideal’ is the word that can be associated with the latest edition of the T20 World Cup 2024. T20s in general have been a batting-friendly content, but this World Cup has proved to be different with a perfect contest between the bat and the ball. Thanks to the pitches, such has been the show by the bowlers that even chasing 120 has been tough for the batters.

Courtesy of the competitive low-scoring matches, we have seen the rise of associate nations against the Test-playing nations. If one calls it an upset, but USA defeating Pakistan and Afghanistan defeating New Zealand have been the highlights of the tournament so far. Courtesy of the wins, both these teams earned a spot in the Super 8, which itself is a very big achievement.

While we saw some really outstanding performances from the associate teams, which players impressed the most in this evenly-matched bat and ball contest? Well, let’s analyze the stats of all the players, and find out the combined best players playing 11 for the Group Stage of T20 World Cup 2024. To have an ideal 11, we will select at least 5 batting options, 1 wicket-keeper, 2 all-rounders, and 6 bowling options in the side.

Table of Contents - Cricgasm

T20 World Cup 2024 – Group Stage Combined Best Playing 11

Opener – Rahmanullah Gurbaz & Travis Head

We start with the best openers from the Group Stage, and there weren’t many options to choose from. Rahmanullah Gurbaz was undoubtedly the best opener from the Group Stage with 167 runs to his name from 4 innings at a good average of 42 and a strike rate of 150. Gurbaz played two match-winning knock, which were crucial for Afghanistan to qualify for the Super 8 stage.

To support Gurbaz, there were options in the form of his countrymate Ibrahim Zadran, Australia’s Travis Head, and USA’s Andries Gouz. All three fantastic in the Group Stage, but to choose between these three, Head felt the most impressive. Except for the first match vs Oman, Head did well in all other three matches. Overall, Head scored 148 runs from 4 innings at a good average of 49 and a strike rate of 157.

Middle-order – Nicholas Pooran, Brandon McMullen & Aaron Jones

Coming to middle-order, Nicholas Pooran, the leading run-getter from Group Stage seems an automatic choice. In the 4 matches that Pooran played in Group Stage, he scored 164 runs from just 4 innings with the highest Individual score by a batter so far at 98. Aside from Pooran’s striking ability, he played according to the situation, which benefitted West Indies big time by winning four matches in a row.

Apart from Pooran, the middle-order duo of Aaron Jones from USA and Brandon McMullen from Scotland impressed the most. Both were among the runs in the tournament – better than any other middle-order batter out there. While McMullen scored 140 runs from 3 innings at an average of 70, Aaron Jones scored 141 runs from 3 innings at a stunning average of 141. Aaron’s match-winning 94 vs Canada lit the tournament on fire.

All-rounders – Marcus Stoinis & Hardik Pandya

Talking about All-rounders, we have Australia’s Marcus Stoinis and India’s Hardik Pandya. While Stoinis has played the role of a batting all-rounder, Hardik has played the role of a bowling all-rounder. Overall, Stoinis has scored 156 runs and taken 6 wickets. Whereas Hardik didn’t get to bat much, but bowled really well with 7 wickets to his name. Other than these two, Russell also did pretty well, but just misses out.

Bowlers – Akeal Hosein, Trent Boult, Anrich Nortje & Fazalhaq Farooqui

Finally, talking about the bowlers, this felt like the toughest selection among all categories. There were so many stunning bowling performances right throughout the World Cup Group Stage. But since we are restricted to selecting only four bowlers including one spinner, we have Akeal Hosein, Trent Boult, Anrich Nortje, and Fazalhaq Farooqui.

Akeal Hosein led the West Indies bowling lineup by bowling mostly in the powerplay. He has taken 8 wickets from just 4 innings in the Group Stage at a brilliant economy rate of 5.1. Similar to Akeal Hosein, if there is one bowler who ruled the powerplay, it is Trent Boult. The master of powerplays in his last T20 World Cup took 9 wickets from just 4 innings at an economy rate of 3.7; just mindblowing.

For the middle-overs and death-overs, two names that did pretty well other than Boult and Hosein were Anrich Nortje and Fazalhaq Farooqi. Fazalhaq Farooqi was the leading wicket-taker in Group stage matches with 12 wickets to his name from 4 innings. Whereas Nortje breathe fire in the middle-overs with 9 wickets to his name from 4 innings at less than run-a-ball.