Australia won the second semi-final against South Africa by 3 wickets and reached the final of ICC Men's Cricket World Cup 2023. Mitchell Starc's all round brilliance helped them to get over the line.

Earlier, South Africa won the toss and chose to bat first. Being inserted to bowl first, the Aussie pace duo Starc and Hazlewood were right on the top under cloudy conditions. They were hitting the deck hard and exploited the pitch perfectly. Starc got Bavuma for a duck and then Josh Hazlewood picked up the man in form Quinton De Kock. Russie Van Der Dussen was struggling and couldn’t cop up with the pressure as the relentless bowling from Starc and Hazlewood got him.

South Africa were stuttering for 44-4. And then Heinrich Klaasen and David Miller came to the crease. The duo had a partnership of 75 runs before Klaasen was knocked over by part timer Travis Head. He got another one in the same over and trapped Merco Jansen for LBW. David Miller then fought with his lone hand. He first scored a fifty and stitched a fine partnership with lower order batter Gerald Coetzee. Miller notched a glorious hundred and was going strongly to post a competitive total on the board. He made a fantastic 101 off 116 balls before falling to Pat Cummins. Australia then bundled South Africa for 212, which was very competitive total on the slowish pitch.

In reply, Australia started off to a flier. Head and David Warner took the protea pacers and were dealing with boundaries. The duo added 60 runs in no time before Warner fell to Markram. And then Mitchell Marsh got a 6 ball duck and Australia fell into pressure. Travis Head wasn’t on a mood to stop the carnage as he made a swashbuckling 62 off just 48 deliveries before falling to Maharaj. Smith was tackling the spinners cautiously and Labuschagne joined him. But the partnership couldn’t stay longer as Labuschagne was trapped LBW by Shamsi. Maxwell was knocked over by Shamsi and South Africa were right into the game. Smith scored a gutsy 30 off 62 balls before falling to Coetzee. Inglis scored a fine 28 off 49 balls but Coetzee knocked him over and Australia fell to 193-7.

But as always, Aussies kept their nerve cool with their skipper and Mitchell Starc stood tall infront of the proteas. And the duo won it for Australia by 3 wickets to book the tickets for Ahmedabad.