T20 World Cup 2026: Brian Bennett, Blessing Muzarabani help Zimbabwe SHOCK former champions Australia
Australia vs Zimbabwe ICC T20 World Cup 2026: For the second game running Blessing Muzarabani was at his destructive best, sending former champions Australia hurtling to a shocking 23-run defeat in a Group B match at the R. Premadasa Stadium in Colombo on Friday. Chasing 170 to win, Australia were rocked immediately by Muzarabani and Brad Evans at the top as Cameron Green and Tim David, returning from injury, were both dismissed for a duck as Travis Head-led side collapsed to 29 for 4.
It was Zimbabwe’s first win over Australia in the T20 World Cup after their stunning win in inaugural edition in 2007. Australia were bundled out for only 146 with the fiery Muzarabani claiming 4/17 while Brad Evans picked up 3/23.
Dream start for Zimbabwe! 3 Down for AUS
Muzarabani bangs it in short and angles it across — David looks to pull but spoons it to short fine leg!
A massive wicket early on and Zimbabwe are up and running in style!
ICC Men’s #T20WorldCup | #AUSvZIM | LIVE NOW … pic.twitter.com/04DkGZl16M
— Star Sports (@StarSportsIndia) February 13, 2026
Both Australia and Zimbabwe were hit with injuries before the clash. Zimbabwe veteran Brendan Taylor, who was hero of his side’s 2007 win over Australia, has been ruled out of the tournament just before the start of their second Group A. ICC have approved Ben Curran to join the squad as replacement of Taylor.
“The Event Technical Committee of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2026 has approved Ben Curran as a replacement for Brendan Taylor in the Zimbabwe squad. Curran was named as a replacement when Taylor was ruled out after sustaining a right hamstring injury during the match against Oman on 9 February,” ICC statement read.
Australia’s injury list is much longer with Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood already out of the tournament and their skipper Mitchell Marsh also sitting on the sidelines, after taking a painful blow on the groin before their opening game against Ireland earlier this week.
Zimbabwe post their 5th win ever vs Australia
It was a memorable day for Zimbabwe as they posted just their fifth win ever against Australia in any format of the game. The first of those wins, of course, came back in 1983 ODI World Cup. Their last win was back in 2022 in Townsville in an ODI match.
The win on Friday built on Zimbabwe’s shock win over Pakistan in T20 World Cup 2022 with Muzarabani also completing his 100 wickets in T20I cricket. “So I was really happy that today really came off really nice. The good thing, I saw the boundary, it was in my favour. So I just had to use the boundary and the wicket was really slow as well. So I just had to adjust. I also believe that everyone really bowled well. And everyone else, you know, came in for the team,” Muzarabani said in the post-match presentation.
Brian Bennett scores his maiden T20 World Cup fifty
Zimbabwe opener Brian Bennett continued his fine form in the tournament so far. After an unbeaten 48 in the opening match against Oman, the youngster posted an unbeaten 64 in 56 balls with 7 fours and his 70-run stand for the second wicket with Ryan Burl (35, 30b, 4×4) set the platform for the big total on a slowish Premadasa track.
Skipper Sikandar Raza came in and smashed an unbeaten 25 off 13 balls with the team’s one and only six off the final ball of the innings.
For Australia, Matt Renshaw put up a brave fight with a 34-ball 50 en route to scoring 65 off 44 balls with 1 six and 5 fours. But apart from Glenn Maxwell’s 31 off 32 balls and skipper Travis Head’s 17, there were no worthwhile innings.
Australia now have a massive task of qualifying from Group B and will face Sri Lanka which can prove to be a must-win game for them if they hope to qualify for the Super 8 stages.