On Wednesday, March 4, at Eden Gardens in Kolkata, New Zealand defeated South Africa by nine wickets in the first semifinal of the 2026 T20 World Cup. They will now travel to Ahmedabad, where they will compete in the competition final on Sunday, March 8.
The New Zealand captain, Mitchell Santner, chose to take the field first after winning the toss. In a 20-over first innings, all-rounder Marco Jansen hit 50 to help South Africa reach a respectable total of 169/8. In the Kiwis bowling department, Matt Henry, Cole McConchie, and Rachlin Ravindra each took two wickets.
The chase was one-way traffic with Finn Allen (100) and Tim Seifert (58) accelerating 117-run opening partnership in 9.1 overs to provide a platform to win the game emphatically. After striking eight sixes and 10 fours, Allen broke 33 balls in a century and crossed the line with 12.5 overs to his side.
The following are the best memes regarding the game on X:
South Africa in every ICC tournament pic.twitter.com/e4IFXr7zL7
— Abhishek (@be_mewadi) March 4, 2026South Africa to New Zealand :
Bhai Sirf Final tak jana hai NRR ka koi Role nahi hai pic.twitter.com/6Mka9lR7gs
— memes_hallabol (@memes_hallabol) March 4, 2026South Africa while playing semifinal and final #SAvsNZ pic.twitter.com/g73laHLL1n
— maithun (@Being_Humor) March 4, 2026South Africa being the best team in World Cup and not winning it pic.twitter.com/zuNiYRAO8m
— Sagar (@sagarcasm) March 4, 2026Match Summary 🏏 #SAvsNZ | #NZvsSA pic.twitter.com/EKW40jLWNI
— Byomkesh (@byomkesbakshy) March 4, 2026NZ coach not holding back 💀 pic.twitter.com/4Lzj95mCGg
— TukTuk Academy (@TukTuk_Academy) March 4, 2026Fans to South Africa pic.twitter.com/VidDPVxJvx
— Sagar (@sagarcasm) March 4, 2026Same old South Africa 🥱#SAvsNZ #NZvsSA pic.twitter.com/OlFARxzVQg
— Desi Bhayo (@desi_bhayo88) March 4, 2026aur kya #T20WorldCup pic.twitter.com/6zvWr8UNJ5
— Arun Lol (@dhaikilokatweet) March 4, 2026South Africa 🚨#SAvsNZ #T20WorldCup26 pic.twitter.com/pZPwmnzaQM
— Raja Babu (@GaurangBhardwa1) March 4, 2026— Out Of Context Cricket (@GemsOfCricket) March 4, 2026 “Just a bad night for us” – Aiden Markram after South Africa loss against New Zealand in the semifinal of T20 World Cup 2026
Aiden Markram, the captain of South Africa, evaluated his team’s performance during the post-match presentation and stated:
“You look at the conditions, they bowled really well up front. The ball was not quite coming on, some were stopping and some were hitting quite low on the bat, they made scoring really tough. Through that pressure builds, you lose wickets unfortunately, give credit to their bowling unit and with the bat if someone plays an innings like that don’t think you will come out on the right side of the result as a fielding side. To get to 170 was a great effort to be fair.”
Markram added:
“At the halfway point, we felt we had a sniff. But as it goes in T20 cricket, the powerplay got off to flier, can’t protect every boundary and they got away. Massive credit to Finn Allen and Tim Seifert’s knocks to kill the game that early, just a bad night for us. Let the emotions settle first and foremost and then we will have a discussion as a group, breakdown the game and try and find areas where we could have been better.”
