Cricket World Cup 2019: Kane Williamson wins toss, New Zealand elect to bowl against Afghanistan

While New Zealand retained the same playing XI, Afghanistan made three changes to their playing XI.

Kane Williamson has won the toss and New Zealand have elected to bowl against Afghanistan in the match 13 of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 at The Cooper Associates County Ground in Taunton on Saturday.

While New Zealand went unchanged, Afghanistan made three changes as Noor Ali and Aftab Alam come in the playing XI.

Justifying his decision to bowl first, Williamson said, “We are going to have a bowl. A fresh wicket and looks a good one. It is nice to have a couple of wins in front of us. But we have to adapt to the new ground and new surface.”

While New Zealand outplayed Sri Lanka in their first game, they had some trouble crossing the finish line against Bangladesh. (Cricket World Cup, AFG vs NZ: FOLLOW LIVE UPDATES)

“It was tough but it was nice to get across the line. They are all tracking very nicely,” said Williamson.

It was pretty much win-win for both the teams at the toss as the Afghanistan skipper Gulbadin Naib said he would have batted first.

“Honestly I would have batted first. It looks like a good wicket. The surface won’t matter much, we have to play positive cricket at the end of the day,” said Naib.

“We have three changes – Dawlat is resting and Aftab comes in, Noor Ali plays his first game and I forgot the last change. We need to do nothing different. We have to get a good start and not give away wickets in the first 10 overs,” he added.

Playing XIs:

Afghanistan: Hazratullah Zazai, Noor Ali Zadran, Rahmat Shah, Hashmatullah Shahidi, Mohammad Nabi, Gulbadin Naib (captain), Najibullah Zadran, Ikram Alikhil (wicketkeeper), Rashid Khan, Aftab Alam, Hamid Hassan

New Zealand: Martin Guptill, Colin Munro, Kane Williamson (captain), Ross Taylor, Tom Latham (wicketkeeper), James Neesham, Colin de Grandhomme, Mitchell Santner, Matt Henry, Lockie Ferguson, Trent Boult