Moeen Ali admits 'everything is a must-win' for England at World Cup

Defending champions England are staring down the barrel in the 2023 World Cup with their title defence threatening to end this week.

Jos Buttler's team have slumped to three defeats in four games, despite being one of the favourites to make it to the semi-finals. Their batting has been below par and a weak bowling attack has been exposed further on flat Indian wickets.

England face Sri Lanka in Bengaluru on Thursday knowing that a fourth defeat in five games will end any realistic hopes of sneaking into the last four.

All-rounder Moeen Ali on Wednesday admitted that his team are in a situation where "everything is a must-win" now.

"We know we've been in this position before although probably not to this degree, but we know everything is a must-win," said Moeen.

"We have to get our confidence and perform well and bat and bowl and field better than we have done so far in this tournament."

England lost heavily to New Zealand in the opening match of the tournament, suffered a shock defeat to Afghanistan in Delhi and then slumped to a 229-run thrashing at the hands of South Africa, conceding their highest total in a one-day international of 399.

Their lone win has come against equally hapless Bangladesh.

England v South Africa - ICC Men's Cricket World Cup India 2023

Moeen admitted his team have not played as aggressively as they normally do, and added players need to take responsibility for their roles.

"We've been playing aggressive cricket throughout since 2015 and done it quite well. Probably the lack of that way of cricket has cost us a little bit in this tournament.

"We haven't been playing that way in my opinion and we need to play that way without slogging the ball. Just be that really aggressive side we know we can