Hazratullah Zazai Earns Late Recall For Bangladesh T20Is

Afghanistan gave their batsman Hazratullah Zazai a late chance to make a comeback in the Twenty20 International side, for the upcoming three-match T20I series against Bangladesh. The enticing series will be starting on Sunday (June 3) in Dehradun.

Moreover, the decision came after a special recommendation by the Afghanistan Cricket Board’s (ACB) selection committee.

Zazai has so far represented Afghanistan in only T20I which came against the United Arabia Emirates (UAE) in 2016, He earned the recall after scoring 69 runs in the pre-series warm-up match against the tourists.

Afghanistan thoroughly dominated the contest to win the game in style.

Batting first, Bangladesh managed 145 for six from their 20 overs, as Mosaddek Hossain scored an unbeaten 38.

In reply, Afghanistan rode on Zazai’s fifty to reach the target by eight wickets with 16 balls to spare.

The three Twenty20 Internationals will be played on June 3, 5 and 7 respectively in Dehradun.

Interestingly, this will also be the first international match for Dehradun’s newly inaugurated Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium.

Meanwhile, Bangladesh skipper Shakib Al Hasan has surprisingly said that Afghanistan are favourites for the series.

“Actually there are no favourites in T20 cricket. Any team can beat any other team in this format,”  Shakib asserted.

Afghanistan maintained eighth in the ICC’s T20 rankings, whereas, Bangladesh is at tenth spot.

“[But] As Afghanistan are two steps ahead of us so I will say that they are the favourites,” he added.

Afghanistan and Bangladesh have faced-off in just one T20I to date, which Bangladesh won by nine wickets.

But that was back in March 2014 in the ICC World T20 in Dhaka. It was a very different Afghanistan then, and they promise to be a very different side when playing Bangladesh at ‘home’ in Dehradun.

Later in the month, Afghanistan will also make their Test debut against India in Bengaluru in a One-off fixture, starting June 14.

Updated squad:

Asghar Stanikzai (c), Mohammad Shahzad, Najeeb Tarakai, Usman Ghani, Najibullah Zadran, Samiullah Shenwari, Shafiqullah Shafiq, Darwish Rasooli, Karim Janat, Mohammad Nabi, Gulbadin Naib, Rashid Khan, Sharafuddin Ashraf, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Shapoor Zadran, Aftab Alam and Hazratullah Zazai.