For the crowd, an almost full house, that flogged the stands of Old Trafford on Tuesday, there was considerable danger in the air. The England cricket team captain Eoin Morgan had decided to take the aerial route against a beleaguered Afghanistan.

Morgan’s innings was the centrepiece of England’s demolition job on Afghanistan as the team piled up 397 for six, the highest score of the tournament by battering the 25 stellar sixes, the maximum number in an ODI innings, bettering their own previous record of 24.

Spartacus, Herculean or simply Morgan, we are one to say, but with every stroke of the bat, the ball kept flying into the stands and at the raptured crowd. Danger was truly in the air.

This carnage came at the heavy expense of one man in particular: the super-talented wrist spinner Rashid Khan. The man who sat atop ODI bowling rankings less than a year ago and was the decimator of T20 leagues, just chewed on career-worst figures of nine overs, none for 110. It was a terrible day for Khan at work.

This is the worst bowling figures in a World Cup, the second worst ever in an ODI – including 11 sixes, another unwanted ODI record, seven of them by Morgan.

Earlier the unwanted record belonged to New Zealand's Martin Snedden's 2/105 off 12 overs (60 overs per side) against England in the 1983 World Cup.

Gulbadin Naib replaced Rashid after he had conceded 54 in his first six, then brought him back. Not like it mattered, since Morgan was already on his way to play his perfect captain innings. It felt like he almost decided to punish Rashid for returning by flicking him again with a straight six, a square six, a third six and bigger still, got around an astonishing hundred.

Here was hell. And hell it was for Rashid, whose unusual performance shocked fans and viewers. Eventually the meme machines went on overdrive too. The personal torment of the wrist-spinner notwithstanding, this was simply too big . The results have been incredible, much like everything else about the match.