There is a sweet video on Instagram from inside Afghanistan's travel from St Vincent to Trinidad and then from the Port-of-Spain airport to their hotel. Bleary-eyed, hoarse of voice, sleepless Afghan cricketers shared their joy with the world and spoke about how all the phone calls from back home kept them awake all night. This was a day after Afghanistan had secured their maiden semi-final spot in a men's World Cup with a thrilling win over Bangladesh. It made you wonder if it was possible to get down from that euphoric high and recover well enough for a big semi-final the next evening. And also if they were already satisfied with what they had achieved.
The answer from the camp is that while it wasn't ideal to be playing again so soon, they were not going to hide behind that. And no, they aren't sated with semi-final participation alone in the T20 World Cup 2024, and are more hurt than proud in the immediate aftermath of the one-sided defeat to South Africa on a brutish track with excessively uneven bounce.
"Obviously playing the last group game and then playing the first semi-final with travel yesterday and getting here and not really having a day off isn't ideal," Jonathan Trott, the Afghanistan head coach, said. "But we knew the schedule, so that's not an excuse as such. When you go on in World Cups or tournaments, you can't have everything your own way, and you've got to fight and play against the odds which you've done at times and very proud of that but no, it's not the reason why we didn't win today.
"We only got back to hotel at 3am, and then we had to leave [for Trinidad] at 8am. We didn't get much sleep, so the guys were obviously very tired and had a lot to process really emotionally and physically. So all new territory for the guys and it all plays its part in a way, but we were outplayed today. The guys hopefully learn from this experience. We've gone one better than the previous 50-over World Cup in November, and it's just about taking it step by step, and hopefully we learn from today, the batters certainly [about] what it takes to play international cricket and play against a bowling side like South Africa on a pitch that's perhaps not conducive to high scoring, finding ways of winning games. And we've found ways of winning games, we just couldn't find a way today."
Trott wasn't taking any moral victories from having defied expectations and come this far in the tournament. "Maybe in a couple of weeks' time, when everything's sunk in and your emotions aren't in it," Trott said when asked if they were looking at the overall achievement more than this defeat. "Once you're in it and part of a World Cup and you've been here for over five weeks preparing for a night like tonight, I think it's sort of hard to think like that, but I'm sure we will in a couple of days or a week or so. So, it's important that a match like this doesn't overshadow all the good matches we had that got us to this situation or this position. But it's nice if we can just find other ways of winning with the bat. That's what I take and that's what I'll be working on from tomorrow."
Hurt was the overwhelming feeling in the camp at the moment. "Whenever you lose a game like this, it's always going to hurt," Trott said. "And it should hurt because we put so much into it. The sacrifices made by the players, coaching staff, management, officials all that sort of stuff. It hurts at the moment.
"We arrived to the ground in high spirits ready to take on a strong South African side and make sure we gave a good account of ourselves, and I feel like we haven't done that today. That's the most disappointing thing. I'm very proud of the guys; this one performance doesn't necessarily define the tournament. But it also gives us an indication of where we need to work on and what we need to get better at. If we're going to be competitive more consistently, and who we can rely on with the bat and who's going to get us over the line, certainly if we have to chase."