Asia Cup 2018: Assessing the contenders for the tournament

#5 Afghanistan

Rashid Khan holds the key for Afghanistan.

When we talk of Afghanistan, it’s hard to overlook and resist one name; Rashid Khan. The 19-year-old has done so much for Afghanistan and every other domestic team that he has represented. This, though, is by far, his biggest test as a cricketer. Against some quality Asian teams, it’s surely not going to be easy, but Rashid has shown everyone during the IPL that he can trouble the best of batsmen.

Mujeeb ur Rahman, too, is a quality bowler, especially with the new ball and even if he doesn’t get wickets, he isn’t someone who’ll leak too many runs. Mujeeb’s advantage is that he is relatively new and not many batsmen in world cricket have played him.

Mohammed Nabi is as clever as they get and his job is to hold one end up while the others go for wickets. The problem area is the lack of quality in the pace department. Wafadar looked good in the Test match against India, but he has been ruled out of this tournament.

The batting almost solely relies on Mohammed Shahzad providing them with a quick start, without which the skipper Asghar Afghan needs to stabilize the innings at number three. Mohammed Nabi is an experienced cricketer and needs to use all of that in the middle order to keep this ‘thin as a thread’ looking Afghanistan batting lineup together.

Having said that, if they can get to the 240-250 mark, the likes of Rashid Khan and Mujeeb ur Rahman could cause a few problems for the opposition.