T20 World Cup 2022: Afghanistan vs England, Highlights, Player of the Match, Post-Match: Curran pockets fifer

Perth, Oct. 22: England opened their T20 World Cup 2022 campaign with a five-wicket win over Afghanistan in a low-scoring Super 12 game in Perth on Saturday.

The Super 12 stage of the marquee tournament got underway on Saturday. While in the first match, New Zealand handed Australia a 89-run thrashing, in the second Super 12 game, Jos Buttler-led England clinched a routine win over Mohammad Nabi-led Afghanistan.

The stark difference between the two sides in their opening game was their fielding. While England were superb on the field, pulling off stunner after stunner, dropped catches and sloppy fielding put Afghanistan on the backfoot.

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After being sent into bat, Afghanistan struggled to put runs on the board against a clinical England side. Jos Buttler's men put up a stellar display on the field, pulling off stunning catches to bowl out the Nabi-led side or 112 in 19.4 overs.

Sam Curran though stole the spotlight as he pocketed a fifer. On a day when the Afghanistan batters struggled to score, Ibrahim Zadran (32) and Usman Ghani (30) top-scored for the side. Though failing to find the boundary ropes, Afghanistan did have wickets in hand, before a massive collapse. From being 90/4 at one stage, Afghanistan collapsed like a pack of cards as they were bowled out for 112.

Currans, who was on a hattrick, failed to pick up a wicket on his hattrick ball. But on the very next delivery Currans picked up a wicket, before pocketing his fifth wicket that saw England wipe up the Afghanistan lower-order. Currans, who turned in figures of 5/10 in 3.4 overs, became the first England player to pick up a fifer in the T20 World Cup.

Meanwhile, Mark Wood and Ben Stokes pocketed two wickets each, while Chris Woakes accounted for one wicket.

In reply, England chased it out, but it wasn't a walk in the park as one would have expected. Needing 113 to win, England got off to a steady start, as opener Buttler and Hales added 35 off 30 for the opening stand. Though the boundaries didn't flow effortlessly and the Afghan bowlers did pocket regular wickets, England chased down their target with ease.

Liam Livingstone top-scored for England with an unbeaten 29 off 21. Needing 1 from 11 to win, the game ended with a wide, as Buttler, leading England for the first time in the World Cup, began the tournament with a win.

The first day of the Super 12 stage saw two contrasting games. While the first match between Australia and New Zealand was a high-scoring affair, where the Kiwis stunned the defending champions, the second Super 12 game was a low-scoring affair, with Sam Curran putting up a stellar show in England's routine win over Afghanistan.

Here are the post-match highlights, awards, player of the match, captain's comments of the Afghanistan vs England match:

Player-of-the-Match: Sam Curran

Sam Curran: We saw the way Afghanistan made it quite tricky in the middle. They have world class winners. You've seen in the qualifying groups, with West Indies missing out that any team can beat anyone. It's nice to get the first win. Hopefully we can keep playing with confidence and keep moving throughout the group. Ireland will be another tricky game. I was just trying to be as adaptable as possible. Just trying to keep contributing to the team and adapting. Trying to get better in different phases of the game. Really enjoying my game at the moment.

Mohammad Nabi (AFG), Losing Captain: It's not a good start to the tournament, but we tried our best to play good cricket. With the bat, we didn't put up a good total. Everyone knows England is the best T20 team in the world. In the end we didn't put up a good total. There were 2-3 good catches. We thought 145 would be a good total. (Spinners) This is our plan. If we put a good total, we have quality spinners and good experience playing in Australia. (Next against NZ) We will learn from this game and we hope we improve our mistakes in the next game.

Jos Buttler (ENG), Winning Captain: Coming into the tournament there's always a few nerves. There's a lot of anticipation, to go out and win is fantastic. (Catches) Fieldings a huge part in this game and the guys were fantastic. (Own catch) Mark Wood's always fun to keep wickets to and he likes to create chances like that so glad to hold onto that. He's a great asset, he's in a good place. (Sam Curran) He's thriving with the extra responsibility, He demands the ball in tough situations and that's a great attitude to have. We know its a really tough period o the game to bowl in. Felt like the ball swung early, they have a talented bowling attack, so it wasn't easy. We were challenged, and felt like we had to pay respects to the bowlers. It could have been more fluent.