Afghanistan Premier League 2018 - All you need to know from the player draft

Afghanistan Cricket Board is only looking forward towards the bright future and is doing everything possible to ensure they take giant strides towards a distinct reputation. In a bid to glorify and speed-up their transition process, they too have joined the suit alongside various other countries to start a T20 League of their own.

Afghanistan Premier League will kick-start on 5th October 2018 in Sharjah, which will see some big players in the fraternity like Chris Gayle, Colin Munro, Mushfiqur Rahim, Shahid Afridi, Mohammad Hafeez, Andre Russell take part. The tournament will have five teams – Balkh, Kabul, Kandahar, Nangarhar, Paktia. All these five sides will have some marquee names as their icon player to go with a few International T20 specialists. The Player Draft was organized on 10th September (Monday).

Players from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Australia, New Zealand, West Indies, South Africa and other countries have decided to take part in the inaugural edition of this tournament. With a galore of big names deciding to grace the tournament with their presence, the world will certainly keep an eye on the APL 2018.

Rashid to represent Kabul

Any T20 tournament is incomplete without the presence of Christopher Henry Gayle. The Windies legend has been drafted in the Balkh side alongside some other familiar names like Colin Munro, Ravi Bopara, and Mohammad Nabi.

Without a shadow of a doubt, Rashid Khan will be the centre of attraction for this big event. He certainly has been the country’s best T20 player in the last two years and he will play for Kabul alongside some big names like Colin Ingram, Luke Ronchi and Sohail Tanvir.

Some other legendary cricketers like Brendon McCullum, Shahid Afridi and T20 stalwart Andre Russell will enter the tournament as the icon player for their respected franchise. This tournament will certainly give great exposure to the young Afghan players who have been performing pretty well at the U19 and domestic level off-late.

The tournament will begin on 5th October and will consist of 23 games in 17 days. The final will be played on 21st October and all the matches will be played in UAE. Here are the squads of the five franchises after the end of the player draft.

Here are the squads:

Balkh: Chris Gayle (Icon Player), Colin Munro, Mohammad Nabi, Ravi Bopara, Aftab Alam, Gulbadin Naib, Mohammad Irfan, Ben Laughlin, Kamran Akmal, Qais Ahmad, Usman Ghani, Ikram Ali Khil, Ryan ten Doeschate

Kabul: Rashid Khan (Icon Player), Laurie Evans, Javed Ahmadi, Farid Malik, Colin Ingram, Luke Ronchi, Hazrat Zazai, Sohail Tanvir, Wayne Parnell, Shahidullah Kamal, Muslim Musa, Laurie Evans, Afsar Zazai, Mohammad Asghar Hotak

Kandahar: Brendon McCullum (Icon Player), Sam Billings, Karim Janat, Najib Zadran, Paul Sterling, Wahab Riaz, Asghar Stanikzai, Tymal Mills, Iftikhar Ahmad, Hamza Hotak, Karim Sadiq, Sam Billings, Sayed Shirzad, Mohammad Naveed

Nangarhar: Andre Russell (Icon Player), Mushfiqur Rahim, Najib Tarakai, Shafiqullah Shafaq, Ben Cutting, Tamim Iqbal, Mujeeb Zadran, Mitchell McClenaghan, Mohammad Hafeez, Rahmat Shah, Naveen ul Haq, Mushfiqur Rahim, Zahir Khan, Sandeep Lamichhane

Paktia: Shahid Afridi (Icon Player), Faheem Ashraf, Samiullah Shinwari, Sharafuddin Ashraf, Cameron Delrport, Thisara Perera, Mohammad Shahzad, Chris Jordan, Luke Wright, Azmatullah Omarzai, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Faheem Ashraf, Zia ur Rahman Akbar, Calum McLeod

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