They surpassed Pakistan's total of 282 at the M. A. Chidambaram Stadium to finish on 286-2 in what was their highest successful chase in the 50 over format.

Ibrahim Zadran top scored with 87 while Rahmanullah Gurbaz reached 65, Rahmat Shah struck an unbeaten 77 and captain Hashmatullah Shahidi posted 48 runs.

The result moved Afghanistan up to sixth, leaving defending champions England bottom of the group stage table.

"This win tastes nice," said Shahidi.

"The way we chased was very professional and the way we did that will help us going into our other games now.

"We are playing quality cricket.

"We have always had belief and at the start of the tournament I told my team I wanted to make it a historic one for our country and our people.

"We did that against England and now against Pakistan.

"Our bowling was very good, especially our spinners.

"We gave Noor a chance and trusted his talent.

"With the bat, the way we started the innings gave us a lot of confidence and momentum."

After starting the tournament brightly with back-to-back wins, Pakistan have now lost three in a row which has put their semi-final hopes in jeopardy.

They began the match well too, reaching 56-0 after the powerplay in what was their best 10-over total batting first in this World Cup.

However, 18-year-old bowler Noor Ahmad disrupted their innings with three wickets.

The wrist spinner took the key dismissals of Abdullah Shafique, Muhammad Rizwan and Babar Azam. 

"That really hurt us," said captain Babar.

"We got a good total.

"Our bowling is not up to the mark.

"In World Cups you need all three departments firing and we haven't done that.

"Afghanistan played very well but we gave them a lot of runs and it cost us.

"We were backing ourselves to win, but they played well in all three departments and we didn't.

"We have got to put that right in our next match."

The World  Cup is set to continue tomorrow as Bangladesh take on South Africa at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai.