Euro T20 Slam: Shahid Afridi becomes icon player for the inaugural season

For former Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi, T2o cricket always opens up a new frontier. The man, who recently made the headlines for controversial takes in his autobiography ‘Game Changer’, has now joined the Euro T20 Slam as an icon player. The 2019 Euro T20 Slam is a T20 tournament, which will take place in August and September, will be co-hosted by Cricket Ireland, Cricket Scotland and Koninklijke Nederlandse Cricket Bond, the cricket board of the Netherlands.

The new T20 tournament in the circuit will feature two franchises each from all the three countries: Amsterdam Kings and Rotterdam Rhinos from Holland; Glasgow Giants and Edinburgh Rocks from Scotland and Belfast Titans and Dublin Chiefs from Ireland. South African players JP Duminy and Imran Tahir are among the six marque players of the tournament kicking off on August 30. Each team will play the other twice in three legs (each leg in each of the three host nations) before the top four teams advance to the semi-finals.

Former Pakistan star Shahid Afridi has been announced as an icon player for this year's inaugural Euro T20 Slam, joining Brendon McCullum, Shane Watson and Rashid Khan.

Imran Tahir, JP Duminy, Babar Azam, Chris Lynn and Luke Ronchi have been named as marquee players. pic.twitter.com/zigRXk5HgO

— ESPNcricinfo (@ESPNcricinfo) May 21, 2019

Afridi, who has scored over 11,000 runs and taken 540 wickets in international cricket, will be among the six icon players along with Australian Shane Warne, New Zealander Brendon McCullum and Afghanistan’s Rashid Khan. Apart from Duminy and Tahir, the other marquee players are Chris Lynn (Australia), Luke Ronchi (New Zealand) and Babar Azam (Pakistan). Two other icon players and one marquee player are yet to be announced. The six franchises will try to pick these marquee and icon players in the draft.

Afridi wants to entertain fans in Europe where Pakistan won World T20 in 2009

Afridi, who has 333 wickets in 303 T20s, said he had enjoyed his days while playing in Leicestershire, Derbyshire and Kent and he is expecting similar wickets and weather in Ireland, Scotland and the Netherlands. The all-rounder said he had once won Pakistan’s only world T20 title in those parts (2009) and he is excited to entertain the fans there.

GS Holding and Woods Entertainment that promote the league have expressed their gratitude and hoped that more star players would come forward to participate in the tournament. Afridi recently courted controversy over his revelations in the autobiography and that included his age.

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