113/5 (18.1)
CR : 6.22
112/10 (19.4)
CR : 5.69
England won by 5 wickets 🏆
Player of the Match
Sam Curran
5/10
18.1
1
A Omarzai to L Livingstone
Short and angling down the leg stump. Liam dances down the ground and pulls it towards the deep square leg region for a single. Need one more run to win!!
18.2
WD
A Omarzai to M Ali
What a way to win the match!! 🌝 Short and goes over the skull of Moeen, the latter leaves and a wide signaled by umpire, Chris Brown. England wins the game by 5 wickets with 11 balls to spare and they have started the tournament in the way they would've desired to.
ENG won by 5 wickets
7:39 PM IST | An anti-climax end to a stuttering run chase as England keep the nerves to beat Afghanistan by 5 wickets with 11 deliveries to fare!
Chasing a small target of 113, England took a cautious approach. Both Jos Buttler and Alex Hales didn’t go hammer and tonk in the powerplay. But they added 35 runs for the first wicket before Buttler (18 off 18) was found wanting to play a pull shot. Hales (19 off 20) was the next one to go, just after team fifty. Dawid Malan (18 off 30) struggled to get going and was taken care of by Mujeeb, thanks to a flying Mohammad Nabi. Before this, Afghanistan got rid of the dangerous Ben Stokes (2 off 4).
While Liam Livingstone batted out of his natural instincts as he rotated the strike well by placing them in the gaps, Harry Brook (7 off 6) holed out at long-on, trying to up and over. In the end, it was Livingstone (29* off 21) and Moeen Ali (8 off 10) who didn’t allow the opponents to sneak in to spoil their party.
Earlier, England won the toss and invited Afghanistan to bat first. The decision of Jos Buttler was proved to be gold dust as the English seamers made the ball talk. Afghan batters couldn’t able to bat in the ball as the bowlers beat the many times. Once Mark Wood found the outside edge of Rahmanullah Gurbaz (10 off 9), Afghanistan didn’t recover. They struggled to get the timing right and sometimes even failed to put the bat on the ball.
Though Ibrahim Zadran (32 off 32) and Usman Ghani (30 off 30) did score around 30, there was no flow in those innings. Sam Curran was brutal with the ball as he took care of the lower-order, running through them to bag the first five-fer in T20Is for an Englishmen. This wonderful spell from Curran (3.4-0-10-5) didn’t allow the Asian country to bat out the overs, as they were skittled out for 112 in 19.4 overs. Other bowlers, Mark Wood and Ben Stokes, scalped a couple of wickets while Chris Woakes picked a wicket.
Stay tuned for the presentations!
Chasing a small target of 113, England took a cautious approach. Both Jos Buttler and Alex Hales didn’t go hammer and tonk in the powerplay. But they added 35 runs for the first wicket before Buttler (18 off 18) was found wanting to play a pull shot. Hales (19 off 20) was the next one to go, just after team fifty. Dawid Malan (18 off 30) struggled to get going and was taken care of by Mujeeb, thanks to a flying Mohammad Nabi. Before this, Afghanistan got rid of the dangerous Ben Stokes (2 off 4).
While Liam Livingstone batted out of his natural instincts as he rotated the strike well by placing them in the gaps, Harry Brook (7 off 6) holed out at long-on, trying to up and over. In the end, it was Livingstone (29* off 21) and Moeen Ali (8 off 10) who didn’t allow the opponents to sneak in to spoil their party.
Earlier, England won the toss and invited Afghanistan to bat first. The decision of Jos Buttler was proved to be gold dust as the English seamers made the ball talk. Afghan batters couldn’t able to bat in the ball as the bowlers beat the many times. Once Mark Wood found the outside edge of Rahmanullah Gurbaz (10 off 9), Afghanistan didn’t recover. They struggled to get the timing right and sometimes even failed to put the bat on the ball.
Though Ibrahim Zadran (32 off 32) and Usman Ghani (30 off 30) did score around 30, there was no flow in those innings. Sam Curran was brutal with the ball as he took care of the lower-order, running through them to bag the first five-fer in T20Is for an Englishmen. This wonderful spell from Curran (3.4-0-10-5) didn’t allow the Asian country to bat out the overs, as they were skittled out for 112 in 19.4 overs. Other bowlers, Mark Wood and Ben Stokes, scalped a couple of wickets while Chris Woakes picked a wicket.
Stay tuned for the presentations!
Sam Curran (Player of the Match for 3.4-0-10-5): "Yeah exactly, I think, the Afghanistan team made things tricky with a lot of world-class spinners in them. Yeah, we've seen that, any team can beat anyone I guess.
It's been an incredible day to be in. Hopeful to keep the confidence and the momentum in the group. Yeah, I think it was a good preparation with not many warm-up games except one against Pakistan. I think Ireland will be a tricky one and hoping for another good game. We are trying to be as adaptable as possible. We are trying to be as good and adaptable according to the situation. Thank You."
It's been an incredible day to be in. Hopeful to keep the confidence and the momentum in the group. Yeah, I think it was a good preparation with not many warm-up games except one against Pakistan. I think Ireland will be a tricky one and hoping for another good game. We are trying to be as adaptable as possible. We are trying to be as good and adaptable according to the situation. Thank You."
Mohammad Nabi | Afghanistan Captain: "Yeah, it's not a good start for the tournament. But we came across a good team. Everyone knows that England is a great team. We need to be on our toes when we play against England, Pakistan, New Zealand, or Australia. Yeah, the boys played really well. They took a few brilliant catches, and hence we fell short of our target. We thought about 150, but we didn't bat well to get to that. We have a good group of spinners. Me and Rashid Khan have a good experience bowling here in Australia as we play here in the Big Bash. We need to be on our mark and play good cricket in the next game.
Jos Buttler | England Captain: "Absolutely, we were good today and won the match. Some good bowling performances from them. For a moment, we were in some trouble. But the guys were handy enough with the bat to take us through.
Absolutely, we bowled well. It was a great game. It is fun to keep the wickets against Mark Wood. He buzzes through. He had those injuries to his back and ankle of late. He is a tough competitor. Hopefully, he will stay the same throughout the game.
Yeah, Sam always wants the ball in his hand. He asks for it, which is the most important thing about him. He bowled well in the death overs. Absolutely, they bowled well and kept us on the back foot. But it was a great performance by the bowlers."
Absolutely, we bowled well. It was a great game. It is fun to keep the wickets against Mark Wood. He buzzes through. He had those injuries to his back and ankle of late. He is a tough competitor. Hopefully, he will stay the same throughout the game.
Yeah, Sam always wants the ball in his hand. He asks for it, which is the most important thing about him. He bowled well in the death overs. Absolutely, they bowled well and kept us on the back foot. But it was a great performance by the bowlers."
7:58 PM IST | So that's a goodbye to the first day of this particular stage of the T20 World Cup. England took the chase quite deep, and Afghanistan's bowling is to be credited for this.
We shall look forward to a lot more action from Australia in the coming days - not just from ICC's marque event, but also from the Women's WBBL. Stay tuned to our network. Until then, it's Arijit Kundu signing off alongside co-commentator Akshaya Krishna Polya and scorer/analyst Paras Yadav.
We shall look forward to a lot more action from Australia in the coming days - not just from ICC's marque event, but also from the Women's WBBL. Stay tuned to our network. Until then, it's Arijit Kundu signing off alongside co-commentator Akshaya Krishna Polya and scorer/analyst Paras Yadav.
Fareed Ahmad Malik
29 yrs
Best24
Innings23
Runs32
SR96.97
Avg32.00
Fareed Ahmad Malik
29 yrs
Best3/14
Innings23
Wickets31
Economy8.95
Avg20.94