Hosts and pre-tournament favourites started their ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 with a rousing performance and beat South Africa by 104 runs in the tournament opener on Thursday at The Oval.
As many as four batsmen hit fifties, including a match-high 89 from Ben Stokes. The all-rounder then took two South African wickets besides taking a stunning catch to win the man of the match award.
Jofra Archer, who only qualified to play for England in March, was the stand-out bowler, taking three wickets. He also managed to rattle legendary Hashim Amla with a nasty bouncer.
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Reactions
Eoin Morgan, England captain:
On the win - Delighted with the performance. It's more satisfying than normal. We were very good today, the wicket didn't allow us to execute our plan which is to try and score quite a considerable total, but I thought the maturity and smart cricket we played shows the effort we put in the last two years and the experience as well.
On Stokes performance - Extremely impressed. He had a field day and especially that catch he took was absolutely outstanding. To have a match-winner like that in the side, he is someone who lifts absolutely everybody and I thought the bowling unit really did get off to a great start and continued to learn from the first innings and then put into place in second innings.
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On Archer's impact - Slowish pitch, he bowled fast and accurate and it's outstanding. He is taking everything in his stride at the moment and he is improving every day and that's very exciting. A huge amount of pleasure. It's an area we were always trying to improve on and certainly, we are looking for match-winning contributions in the field.
Faf du Plessis, South Africa captain:
On what went wrong - I think we have been outplayed in all three departments. Basically, we were 3 down in 12 overs and I think we were looking for 330-340 but when we took the pace off we thought 300 was par.
On Imran Tahir opening the bowling: It was a plan. We wanted to target those two openers with leg spin, especially Roy. It worked today.
On England's batting - Their batting was really good. They are a top-quality team and they showed that with the bat today.
On Hashim Amla condition - He is okay now and when he came back to the dressing room, he looked fine and hopefully that's a good sign for the next game. When we have Dale [Steyn] and all our resources, we back our bowling to restrict teams under 300.
Ben Stokes, man of the match:
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On that catch - I was a little further in than I should have been. I panicked a bit I guess but it stuck. I shouldn't have been there and it was probably a regulation catch but I was in the wrong position.
On the pitch - The message from the batsmen in the middle was that it was a tricky pitch to bat on, so the aim was to get to 300-310. Maybe 330. I was looking to just pace it. The hard length was difficult and obviously, the slower balls and all. Towards the end, South Africa bowlers were really hard to get away.
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On the importance of having 300+ total - I guess psychologically getting over the 300-run mark really helped. And then, our bowlers knew what to do and they executed well.
England play Pakistan next, on Monday; while South Africa take on Bangladesh a day earlier.
