Australia has the legacy. India has the recency. And New Zealand has the consistency.

That is one way to sum up performances at ICC limited-overs World Cups in the last decade. Since 2015, Sunday will mark the fifth time New Zealand’s men feature in the final of a global tournament—a testament to their sustained excellence across formats.

Yet captain Mitchell Santner knows that the team often dubbed the “nicest guys” in world cricket will have to break a billion hearts if they are to lift the Men’s T20 World Cup trophy on Sunday night.

For Santner, the choice is straightforward. “I wouldn’t mind winning a trophy,” Santner said at a crowded media conference at the Narendra Modi Stadium on Saturday, on the eve of the final. “You look at this group and the groups that have been in the past, and we are pretty consistent in our thoughts. We try not to get ruled by the situation or the opponents. We just go out there and do our thing as a unit.

“It’s been no different this time. Everyone knows we are probably not the favourites, but we don’t mind that. If we do the little things well and put in a strong team performance, it can put us in a good position to hopefully lift the trophy. But yeah, I wouldn’t mind breaking a few hearts to do that.”

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India, meanwhile, has been nearly invincible in ICC tournaments of late. In their last 30 matches across global events, the host have lost only twice—the 2023 ODI World Cup final against Australia and the Super Eight clash against South Africa last month. Both defeats came at this very venue.

Australia captain Pat Cummins, whose famous “silence the crowd” remark echoed through the stadium in 2023, believes handling the atmosphere will again be key. “I guess that’s the goal—to silence the crowd,” Cummins said. “There are a lot of variables in T20 cricket. It’s fickle at times. We’ve seen throughout this World Cup that teams are very evenly matched. It often comes down to a few small moments that change the outcome.”

Cummins also pointed to the pressure on the host. “There is obviously a lot of pressure on India to win this World Cup at home. If we don’t win, it would be pretty cool to win a home World Cup. That comes with added pressure, so we can go out there and try to put that pressure on them and see what happens.”

For New Zealand, the final also carries recent context. The two sides met in a five-match T20I series in India just before the tournament—a contest India dominated 4-1. Santner believes the lessons from that series have helped the Black Caps during the World Cup.

“In terms of planning and execution, it was a great series. We were challenged a lot of times,” Santner said. “You build on what works and what doesn’t and take that information forward.

“We obviously played on five pretty good surfaces around India. I’m not sure what it’s going to play like here, but I assure you it’s going to be pretty good. Guys will take good conversations from that series into this game. But a World Cup final is a little bit different to a bilateral series.”

Published on Mar 07, 2026