India vs Afghanistan ICC ODI World Cup 2023: 5 talking points from the match

Rohit and Ishan shared a 156-run partnership for the opening wicket to set the platform for the chase.

India made it two wins out of two at the 2023 ODI World Cup on Wednesday, after beating Afghanistan by eight wickets at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in New Delhi.

Skipper Rohit Sharma played one of the most aggressive ODI World Cup knocks of his career, making an 84-ball 131 that paved the way for the Men in Blue to collect the two points and head into the marque clash against Pakistan at Ahmedabad on Saturday, high on confidence.

Here are the five talking points from the match:

Rohit Sharma sets the stadium ablaze

Rohit Sharma made amends for falling for a duck in India's ODI World Cup opener on Sunday by making 131 runs in 84 balls with 16 fours and five sixes. It was clean, powerful hitting from the Indian captain who stroked boundaries to all parts of the Arun Jaitley Stadium and demoralised the Afghanistan bowlers.

During the course of the innings, the right-hander broke several records including crossing Chris Gayle's mark for the most sixes hit by any player in international cricket, the fastest hundred by an Indian in ODI World Cup history (63 balls) breaching Virender Sehwag's mark of 81 balls and the most centuries hit by any player in ODI World Cups, going past Sachin Tendulkar who made six hundreds in his ODI World Cup career.

Take a bow, Rohit Sharma

Fastest ton by an Indian at the World Cups.

Most tons at the ODI World Cups.

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Domination with a silken touch.

Ro ‘Super’ hit Sharma #CWC23 #IndvAfg

— Aakash Chopra (@cricketaakash) October 11, 2023

Shahidi makes India sweat in Delhi heat

When Afghanistan won the toss and opted to bat first on Wednesday, they would have known that anything less than a strong batting performance would not keep them in the game when they came out to bowl, in the second session.

Leading from the front in ensuring that they got to a respectable score was their captain Hashmatullah Shahidi, who made an 88-ball 80 with 10 fours and one six.

It was just the sort of captain's innings which his side needed and it helped them eventually post 272 runs on the board in 50 overs.

Bumrah shines in tough conditions

To understand the measure of how difficult it was to bowl on this Arun Jaitley Stadium surface, one of India's most prolific bowlers in recent times- Mohammed Siraj- went wicketless in his nine overs and conceded 76 runs.

On such a pitch, Jasprit Bumrah showed his class and claimed figures of 4 for 39 in his 10 overs, that included the wicket of Ibrahim Zadran in the Powerplay overs and the wickets of Mohammad Nabi, Najibullah Zadran and Rashid Khan at the backend of the innings which ensured Afghanistan did not get too close to the 300-run mark.

On a wicket that offered almost nothing to the bowlers, Jasprit Bumrah put in a masterful bowling performance.

Omarzai offers hope in the middle

If there was an area of concern for Afghanistan before the start of the ODI World Cup, it was their middle-order batting and who would make the decisive contributions for them after the first few wickets fell.

On Wednesday, the Afghans got a glimpse of who that player could be after Azmatullah Omarzai stroked his way to a 69-ball 62 that contained two fours and four sixes.

His performance in the middle will give Shahidi and co. the confidence that Afghanistan can get to competitive scores batting first in the upcoming games.

Kohli scores back-to-back fifties, becomes leading run-getter in World Cups

It wasn't just Rohit Sharma who was breaking records on Wednesday. During the course of his second consecutive fifty at this World Cup, Virat Kohli also got his name in the record books after going past Sachin Tendulkar for the most number of runs scored in all World Cup (ODI and T20) matches.

Playing his 53rd World Cup match, Kohli went past Tendulkar's mark of 2278 runs with an average in excess of 60. Kohli played his first World Cup in any format in 2011 and won the tournament, in his first-ever appearance.

Kohli has played in five T20 World Cups for India and has scored 1141 runs in 25 innings with 14 fifties to his name. He was adjudged the Player of the Tournament in the 2014 and 2016 editions of the tournament.