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Hashmatullah Shahidi
The Afghanistan Cricket Board appointed Hashmatullah Shahidi as the captain of the national team for Tests and ODIs. Rahmat Shah will function as Hasmatullah Shahidi's deputy in Afghanistan's forthcoming games. The board recently approved the idea of split captaincy for the national men's team and also sacked Asghar Afghan as the team's captain. The vice-captaincy in the shortest format of the game has been handed to all-rounder Rashid Khan. The decision regarding the skipper of the T20 format is yet to be made.
Asghar Afghan's lay-off as Afghanistan's captain came after the board's investigation committee's report. The report stated that some of his decisions had led to the team's loss against Zimbabwe earlier this year in the UAE. Zimbabwe went on to win the Test match by 10 wickets within two days to hand Afghanistan an embarrassing defeat. However, the team bounced back more robust in the second Test to level the series 1-1.
Afghanistan to play three ODIs and as many T20Is against Pakistan in UAE
The newly appointed captain, Shahidi's first assignment is likely to be against Pakistan. Afghanistan will be playing three ODIs and as many T20Is against Pakistan in UAE. Pakistan and Afghanistan have played against each other in ICC and Asian Cricket Council events. However, both sides have never played a bilateral series at the senior level. Afghanistan had also sent its team to Pakistan several times to play against the A-sides.
Reportedly, Pakistan's Prime Minister Imran Khan has requested the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to conduct a series between the two nations. Meanwhile, the Afghanistan cricket team is also going to face Australia in a one-off Test in November this year. The test match is a part of ICC's original Future Tours Programme (FTP), which was actually supposed to be played last year. But due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it had to be postponed.
The last time Pakistan and Afghanistan faced each other was back in the year 2019, during the ICC ODI World Cup. The match between the two teams went till the last over, but Pakistan ended on the winning side. Pakistan has won all four ODIs against Afghanistan to date. The two teams have also met in Sharjah in 2013 for a single T20I game, and Pakistan also won that match. However, that was the only T20I game that the teams played.