Rashid Khan to miss T20Is vs India, to continue rehabilitation in India
In what is a significant blow for the visiting Afghan contingent, Rashid Khan has been ruled out of the upcoming 3-match T20 International series against India. Rashid was named in the 19-member squad announced by the Afghanistan Cricket Board but his participation was subject to fitness. The star leg-spinner recently went under the life to deal with a lower-back issue. Consequently, he had to withdraw from two big competitions, the Big Bash League and the SA20.
He had also missed the recent 3-match series against UAE which Afghanistan won 3-0. It is to be noted that Rashid is the official T20 International skipper of the national side and in his absence, Ibrahim Zadran led the side. Zadran will manage captaincy duties in this series as well.
Zadran acknowledged that Rashid’s absence would be a huge miss but emphasized the need to be ready for such situations. “Without Rashid, we will struggle but not that much because his experience is very important for all of us, but this is cricket and you should be ready for any kind of situation,” he said. In the absence of Rashid, the likes of Mujeeb-ur-Rahman, Mohammad Nabi, Qais Ahmad, Noor Ahmad and Sharafuddin Ashraf will have to step up big time if Afghanistan wants to harbour any hopes of challenging the Rohit Sharma-led India.
The return of the two stalwarts
The series has gained a lot of traction over the last couple of weeks as people expected Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli to return to India’s T20 squad. The selection was exactly along those lines as the two stalwarts return to the Indian T20I setup after more than a year. The semi-final of the 2022 T20 World Cup in Australia was the last time the duo represented the country in the short format of the game.
As such, there will be a lot of spotlight on this series. Another factor which makes this series crucial is the fact that this is India’s last T20I assignment before they play the T20 World Cup in the USA and West Indies in June. Hence, this series will be an extremely important one for some players who will try to make a case for their selection.
