England v Afghanistan: how to watch T20 World Cup Super 12 fixture on TV in UK - dates, start time and squads

The T20 World Cup is currently enjoying its preliminary group stage as eight teams compete for a place in the upcoming Super12 competition. While countries such as Scotland, Ireland and two-time T20 World Cup champions West Indies all fight for a spot in next week’s matches, England are preparing for their first Super12 fixture against Afghanistan this weekend.

Jos Buttler and his squad suffered their latest heartbreak on Wednesday 19 October when it was revealed Reece Topley would be forced to miss the tournament due to rupturing his ankle ligaments in England’s warm-up series against Australia earlier this week. Tymal Mills has now been called up to the main squad as his replacement, mirroring the events of 2021 which saw Topley replace an injured Mills in Qatar.

At last year’s T20 World Cup, England reached the semi-finals before succumbing to New Zealand. However, with an ODI World Cup on the horizon in 2023, Buttler will hope he can secure England the T20 trophy so they can hold both white-ball titles before beginning their defence of the 50-over format competition in India next autumn.

Here is all you need to know ahead of England’s first T20 World Cup match this weekend...

When is England v Afghanistan?

The two nations will meet on Saturday 22 October 2022 with a start-tme scheduled for 12pm BST. The match will be played at the Perth Optus Stadium in Western Australia, located in the suburb of Burswood. IT has a capacity of 60,000 and hosts the Perth Scorchers BBL team as well as the Fremantle Football Club and West Coast Eagles Australian Rules football team.

How to watch England v Afghanistan?

All of the matches at the T20 World Cup in Australia will be available to watch on Sky Sports Cricket and Sky Sports Main Event. Subscription for Sky Sports starts at £46/month and fans can stream the match by tuning in to SkyGo. NowTV also offer daily passes to Sky Sports which are available to £11.99/day.

England v Afghanistan head-to-head

The two sides have only met in two T20 matches previously. The first came at the 2012 World Cup while the second came at the 2016 World Cup and England were victorious on both occasions.

Before the World Cup warm-up matches, where Afghanistan beat Bangladesh by 62 runs, Afghanistan reached the Super4 of the Asia Cup but lost to Sri Lanka, Pakistan and India. In their group stage, however, Afghanistan finished top having beaten both Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

England, on the other hand, enter this tournament off the back of two series wins. The first came with their 4-3 win over Pakistan in September and the latter was their 2-0 win over Australia last week. Paddypower are giving England 1/7 to win while Afghanistan are 9/2 to take victory.

Who’s in the squads?

The playing XI has not yet been chosen for either team and will likely be announced on Friday night or early on Saturday. Here are the full World Cup squads for both teams:

Afghanistan: Mohammad Nabi (C), Najibullah Zadran, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Azmatullah Omarzai, Darwish Rasooli, Fareed Ahmad Malik, Fazal Haq Farooqi, Hazratullah Zazai, Ibrahim Zadran, Mujeeb ur Rahman, Naveen ul Haq, Qais Ahmad, Rashid Khan, Salim Safi, Usman Ghani. Reserves: Afsar Zazai, Sharafuddin Ashraf, Rahmat Shah, Gulbadin Naib

England: Jos Buttler (C), Moeen Ali, Harry Brook, Sam Curran, Chris Jordan, Liam Livingstone, Dawid Malan, Adil Rashid, Phil Salt, Ben Stokes, Tymal Mills, David Willey, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood, Alex Hales Reserves: Liam Dawson, Richard Gleeson, Luke Wood