Rashid Khan: All you need to know about IPL's most expensive Afghanistan player

You will definitely not know much about Rashid Khan if you do not follow the cricket matches of the ICC Associate Members. Khan is an Afghanistan cricketer who made his debut for the national side at a very young age. An age where he did not even possess the right to vote in his country’s elections.

Khan was just a teenager when he donned his national colours for the first time. He is basically a leg-spinner who has a hurried action. In addition to this, he is one of the few cricketers who will rush through their quota of overs in a match.

Afghanistan is yet to be granted Test match status in the International arena. So far they have played 72 One-Day International matches and 55 T20 Internationals. Out of those, Khan has featured in 18 ODIs and 21 T20I matches.

His debut appearance was against Zimbabwe in the October 2015 in an ODI and went on to make his T20I debut against the same opposition at Bulawayo. Since then Khan has time and again impressed everyone and has now cemented his place in the Afghanistan national setup as a frontline spinner.

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#5 He made his debut at the age of 17

Rashid Khan was just 17 years and 28 days when he made his One Day debut. In his first match, Rashid Khan repaid the selectors’ faith, not with wickets thought but his control on the ball. The leggie just went for 30 runs in his quota of 10 overs in the match and picked up one wicket.

However, Khan’s best performance came a little after 4 months. He picked up 25/3 against UAE in the Asia Cup and registered another 3 wicket haul against Namibia in the qualifier stage of the World T20 in 2016. He snatched 3 wickets for just 11 runs.

Khan is not only known for his bowling abilities, he is a handy batsman in the lower order as well. He occasionally chips in with composed knocks of handful amount of runs lower down the order.

#4 Inspired by Shahid Afridi

Bowlers like Rashid Khan can unsettle the batsmen due to their swift over-rate

Shahid Afridi made his debut at a very young age. When Afridi played his first game for the Pakistan national team in the year 1996, he was a prodigy at 16 years of age. Rashid Khan was in teenage as well when he made his T20 debut.

In addition to this, both Afridi and Khan are right arm leg-spinners. While the former is famous for bowling quicker deliveries, the latter is known to bowl his spell of overs very quickly.

Another common thing that Afridi and Khan have is that both of them are big hitters of the cricket ball and are renowned as bowling all-rounders in their respective countries.

Khan has really done well to follow Afridi’s footsteps and he is now an established player in the Afghanistan side. In his short journey so far, he has maintained an economy rate of 6.14 in T20I and an amazing 3.97 in ODIs.

#3 Took up Cricket in 2012

Khan has admitted that he has grown unbelievably in just over 5 years

Khan was born in Nangarhar province of Afghanistan. The province has 32 districts and the atmosphere is extremely hostile. The districts of that province are always in the news for terrorist attacks either from Pakistan or the ISIS.

In spite of his upbringing in such a challenging part of the country, Khan has gone on to represent his country at a very young age.

Khan took up cricket only in the year 2012. He was a street-smart cricketer and enjoyed playing the game along with his brothers in the streets outside his home. But he did not expect himself to transform into nation’s prime spinner in such a short time.

In an interview with ICC-Cricket.com, he said, “It’s been quite a fast achievement from me to so quickly play for the national side. All I did was to try and play simple cricket, nothing big.” While he was playing for the Afghanistan Under-19, he has taken 10 wickets in the 6 matches he played with best figures of 3 for 16.

#2 Highest ranked Associate player

The spinner has transformed into potential match-winner for his national side

In February last year, Rashid Khan was ranked 59 in the list of T20 bowlers with just 398 rating points. But the leggie has improved drastically within a year. At the moment, the leg-spinner is ranked at No. 5 in the ICC T20 bowler rankings. He boasts an astonishing rating point of 701 to his name.

Khan’s performances strongly support his ranking as he has picked up 33 wickets in the T20 format in just 21 games at an impressive average of 16.06.

He has decent experience in the T20 Leagues as well. He played for Comilla Victorians in the Bangladesh Premier League in 2016 and picked up 13 wickets and again maintained an impressive economy rate of 6.06. Khan is determined to continue to do well in the limited overs cricket and has a dream to lead his country into playing the 5-day format of the game as well.

#1 Bought for 4 Crores by Sunrisers Hyderabad

It will be interesting to see how he performs in a star-studded league like IPL

All these years, Ryan ten Doeschate used to be the only player in the IPL from the Associate Nations. But the scenario changed this time around. Three players out of the six from the Associate teams were sold in the IPL auctions.

Chirag Suri of UAE and Afghan skipper Mohammad Nabi were auctioned for their base price. But the real shock was when Rashid Khan was the cause of an amazing biding-battle between Mumbai Indians and Sunrisers Hyderabad.

Eventually, Sunrisers bagged the spinner for a jaw-dropping fee. SRH were in desperate need of a spinner and ensured that the signing of the big-hitting bowling all-rounder. The David-Warner led side will bank heavily on Khan after he became the costliest player ever from the Associate Nations. He cost SRH more than 5 times the amount an IPL franchise had paid to an Associate Nation's Player.