Barbados, News Agency: India got off to a flying start in the Super-8 round in the West Indies by winning the preliminary round in the US, with a comfortable 47-run win over Afghanistan in their first match. Batting first, India scored 181 for 8. Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Rishabh Pant failed. Afghanistan skipper Rashid Khan took 3 crucial wickets to put India on the backfoot, but the Surya-Hardik pair made the most of it. Suryakumar Yadav (53) and Hardik Pandya (32) took notice of Afghanistan's bowlers. Surya completed his half-century in 27 balls, while Hardik also batted well. Then started The Jasprit Bumrah Show.. Bum Bum Bumrah took 3 wickets for just 7 runs while breaking the back of the Afghanistan batting. Due to this, the Afghan innings was wrapped up in 134 runs.
Rahmanullah Gurbaz hit a four and a six in Arshdeep's first over as India chased down 181 on a slow Bridgetown pitch. But the peace did not last long. Bumrah dismissed Gurbaz (11) in the next over. Recognizing the color of the pitch, Rohit handed over the fourth over to Akshar Patel. Virat dropped the catch of Ibrahim Zadran but Akshar Patel and Rohit Sharma ensured that it was not costly. Zadran was dismissed for 8 runs. Bumrah forced Hazratullah Zazai (2) to take a catch to Jadeja in his second over. At this time, Afghanistan was 23 for 3.
After this, Gulbuddin Naib and Azmatullah Omarzai prevented the collapse. Kuldeep Yadav broke this partnership which was heading towards a half century. He took a catch to Naib Pant who scored 26 runs. His partner Jadeja fell victim. Omarzai (26) takes a catch to Akshar Patel.
Najibul Zadran became Bumrah's third victim. On 19 runs, he gave a catch to Arshdeep. Mohammad Nabi hits Kuldeep for a six. And in the second attempt he gave a catch to Jadeja. He scored 14 runs. Arshdeep, who proved costly in the first spell, took the last three wickets. On the last ball of the innings, Afghanistan's innings ended for 134 runs. India's Jasprit Bumrah took 3 wickets for 7 runs. Arshdeep (3 wickets) and Kuldeep Yadav (2) supported him well.
Kuldeep Yadav was included in the Indian team instead of Mohammad Siraj, seeing that Barbados' pitch was slow. After winning the toss, Indian captain Rohit Sharma took to bat but faced the spin of Afghanistan captain Rashid Khan. Rashid took 3 wickets after Rohit Sharma (8) once again failed in front of the left-arm fast bowler. Rishabh Pant (20), Virat Kohli (24) and Shivam Dubey (10) returned.
After this, Suryakumar Yadav and Hardik Pandya took good news of Afghanistan's bowlers. The pair changed gears till the 15th over. Both of them shared a partnership of 60 runs in 37 balls. Surya was caught for 53 runs off 28 balls with 5 fours and 3 sixes. Hardik (32 runs, 24 balls, 3 fours and 2 sixes) was caught in the 18th over off the bowling of Naveen Ul Haq. He was dismissed earlier, but was saved by DRS. He could not take advantage of this. Ravindra Jadeja was dismissed for 7 runs and Farooqui took 3 wickets for 33 runs. Akshar Patel played a good knock in the last over (12) to take the team to 181 for 8.
