Rashid Khan, Mohammad Nabi, Mujeeb Ur Rahman To Head Directly To IPL From CPL

The Afghanistan players who are currently in the Caribbeans for the ongoing Caribbean Premier League (CPL) and will later play in the Indian Premier League (IPL) will fly directly to UAE from Trinidad & Tobago. A total of six Afghanistan players are taking part in CPL 2020.

Three of the players – Rashid Khan, Mohammad Nabi and Mujeeb Ur Rahman – will play in the IPL later this month. All the six players have been allowed to continue playing in the Caribbean by the ACB (Afghanistan Cricket Board) despite a clash with the Shpageeza T20 league at home.

The Shpageeza league is set to begin this Sunday in Kabul while the CPL runs till next Thursday. Out of the six players, only Rashid’s side Barbados Tridents have crashed out of the competition. The other five players – Mujeeb (Jamaica Tallawahs), Nabi (St Lucia Zouks), Zahir Khan (Zouks), Najibullah Zadran (Zouks) and Naveen-ul-Haq (Guyana Amazon Warriors) will be in action in the playoffs.

According to the previous plan, the ACB was meant to fly the six players to Kabul on a charter plane. Previously, Nazeem Jaar Abdulrahimzai, the acting chief executive officer of the ACB, had said the plan was to fly the Afghanistan players in the CPL to Kabul by September 5, a day before the start of the Shpageeza league.

However with most countries in the Caribbean closing their borders, including Trinidad & Tobago, the ACB faced logistical challenges in arranging the charter.  Rashid, Nabi and Mujeeb will now head directly to the UAE to participate in the IPL, according to ESPNCricinfo.

With the IPL imposing a mandatory six-day quarantine, the ACB conceded that the three players would not have enough time to join their franchises if they were to participate in the Shapageeza League. On the other hand, the other three players will travel to Kabul on September 12 and participate in the Shpageeza League.

“We understand the importance of the Shpageeza Cricket League to the ACB and the reasons why it had to be scheduled during the CPL after the NOCs were all issued,” Pete Russell, CPL’s COO said in a media release.

“We truly appreciate the Chairman of the ACB allowing these six Afghan players to stay at the Hero CPL until its conclusion. Afghan players have had a huge impact on our competition, both this season and in previous years, and we are very grateful to have them with us until the final on 10 September,” he added.

Rashid and Nabi will play for Sunrisers Hyderabad while Mujeeb will ply his trade for Kings XI Punjab. IPL 2020 is scheduled to start on September 19. The tournament is being played in UAE because of the alarming coronavirus situation in India.

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