NEW DELHI: England was given an almighty scare before beating Afghanistan by 15 runs in Delhi to keep their World Twenty20 campaign on track.
England lost three wickets in an over to slip to 42-4, then 57-6, but got to 142-7 thanks to a 33-ball stand of 57 between Moeen Ali and David Willey.
Willey then removed Mohammad Shahzad in the first over of the Afghan reply. From there, regular wickets meant Afghanistan were never in the chase, eventually falling away to 127-9.
It meant Afghanistan, the only side outside of Test cricket left in the competition, missed out on recording their first win against one of the game’s major nations.
As for England, they avoided the sort of upset that would have ranked alongside defeats by Ireland, the Netherlands (twice) and Bangladesh (twice) in recent World Cups and World T20s.
Eoin Morgan’s men will definitely reach the last four if they beat Sri Lanka on Saturday and South Africa are defeated by West Indies on Friday.
