Four minutes before 10 at night, when New Zealand’s opening batter, Finn Allen, smashed the tenth boundary to complete the century to carry them to the final during the semifinal of the Men’s T20 World Cup 2026 against South Africa at the iconic Eden Gardens in Kolkata, it was 5:30 in the morning in Auckland, and the same time zone in Dunedin.

The home fans stayed back for the whole night and supported their Kiwis side as they thumped the unbeaten Proteas, who are the runners-up from the previous edition of the event, out of the campaign. Finn Allen had just scored a T20I century in just 33 balls to get his name into the history books.

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“Oh yeah, I think you take the positives from this game for sure, celebrate a little moment of success. And then, we’ve got a final to win on Sunday, so we just look forward to that. I'm sure my parents were up watching the whole game. Hopefully they're proud.” Allen said at the end of the game, after winning the ‘player of the match’ award.

Fans’ celebration of New Zealand’s T20 WC 2026 semifinal goes viral

Besides those 10 boundaries, there were eight over boundaries- 88 runs of his 100 came in just boundaries, and he played only three dot balls. That was the least number of dot balls a player has played in a World Cup game, along with Virat Kohli, who contributed the same during the semifinal of the 2014 World Cup against the Proteas.

Watch the video here: 

Absolute scenes in this Dunners flat when Finn Allen hit the fastest 100 in T20 World Cup history and put NZ into the Final! @BLACKCAPS #cricket #blackcaps #nz #sport #finnallen pic.twitter.com/YBunfPyJ1V

— The ACC (@TheACCnz) March 4, 2026

A video went viral on social media platforms where the New Zealand fans used a screen to enjoy the game and celebrated crazily after the end of the clash. That was when the Blackcaps completed the nine-wicket win as Allen smashed an overall 20 sixes, which is the most sixes in a T20 WC edition.

Allen has now joined the opening batter of the Kiwis, Brendon McCullum, and their middle order batter, Glenn Phillips, to celebrate centuries in the T20 WCs. Allen’s 100* is the highest score in a T20 WC knockouts.