Sam Curran took England’s first-ever five-wicket haul in T20s as they started their World Cup campaign by skittling Afghanistan for 112 in 19.4 overs at Perth.
Curran was outstanding, with four wickets in the space of six balls and finished with remarkable figures of five for 10, with Mark Wood and Ben Stokes each chipping in with a couple of dismissals.
There were some highlight-reel catches from England through Liam Livingstone, Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid in the outfield while Jos Buttler relied on his sharp reflexes behind the stumps.
Only leg-spinner Rashid went at more than a run-a-ball in a pedestrian effort from Afghanistan, with Ibrahim Zadran (32) and Usman Ghani (30) contributing more than half of their runs.
Chris Woakes was passed fit after a tight quad while Livingstone was included in a batter-heavy England XI but any sense they may be light on bowling was quickly dismissed in this Super 12s opener.
Stokes opened the bowling in his first match in this competition since the 2016 final, when he conceded four successive sixes as Carlos Brathwaite claimed an unlikely win for the West Indies.
Wood struck with his first delivery as he tickled the edge of Rahmanullah Gurbaz while he touched 96mph with his second ball and from there, England were rarely put on to the back foot.
Stokes had a couple of wickets as Hazratullah Zazai and Najibullah Zadran were snared by running, diving catches from Livingstone and Rashid, either side of Moeen taking a catch over his shoulder to see off Ibrahim Zadran.
Buttler took a fantastic leaping catch down the leg-side to hand Wood his second dismissal.
Curran then took two in two when he was brought back for the 18th over following more simple catches in the deep.
While he missed out on a hat-trick, Curran had three in four when Ghani slapped to deep backward point and then four in six when Fazalhaq Farooqi picked out Dawid Malan to end the innings.
