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UAE's Asif Khan made headlines today (Thursday, March 16) after scoring 101* off 42 deliveries against Nepal. He walked out to bat in the 38th over of the innings when the score was 175/5 and hit four fours and 11 sixes.
Asif smashed the fastest ODI hundred by a player from an associate nation. He overtook South African wicketkeeper Mark Boucher to go fourth in the list of the fastest hundreds in the format's history.
Here's a look at five interesting facts about the UAE batter.
#1 Born in Pakistan
Asif Khan was born in Lahore, Pakistan, on February 15, 1990. He also played two matches for the Pakistan U-19 team way back in 2007.
Batting at number 5, he scored 32 off 55 balls against Australia U-19 in Mirpur in the only innings he batted. The bowling attack also had Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Kane Richardson. Pakistan U-19 won the game by five wickets.
#2 Played for the now-defunct Lahore Lions
Lahore Lions was a domestic cricket franchise established by the Lahore Regional Cricket Association. They were the second most successful T20 team after Sialkot Stallions before being dissolved in 2016.
Khan played two T20s for them in the 2008-09 season, scoring 44 runs in two innings.
#3 Moved to the UAE in 2017
To improve his prospects of playing international cricket, the batter moved to the United Arab Emirates in 2017. There was a cooling-off period of 5 years, after which he was eligible to represent the UAE.
He let go of a chance to move to Canada as well.
#4 Made his ODI debut in March 2022
Asif made his ODI debut for the United Arab Emirates last year against Oman in the ongoing ICC Men's Cricket World Cup League 2. He scored 22 off 30 balls, batting at number 5.
Since then, he has played 16 matches and scored 439 runs at an average of 36.58 and a strike rate of 77.28 with a century and three half-centuries to his name.
#5 Scored a duck in his last first-class match
Asif Khan has played a fair bit of first-class cricket for Lahore. He scored 1244 runs in 55 innings at an average of 23.92. Khan played his last game in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy 2014, where he opened the batting and was dismissed for a two-ball duck.
