Afghanistan captain Mohammad Nabi along with the other four captains Virat Kohli, Misbah-ul-Haq, Angelo Mathews and Mushfiqur Rahim are about to bring out the inaugration ceremony of Asia Cup. It is going to be a lifetime experience for Nabi as it is Afganistan’s first turnout in major one day international matches.
Three former world champions are taking part in this tournament and that would be a golden oppurtunity for someone like Nabi to gather every single small things about captaincy. He has led the team in four ODIs only and in this tournament he is able to accumulate as much information as he can, as his greater goal is to look forward towards 2015 ICC World Cup.
As India has gone through two back to back winless overseas series, so there is a huge pressure on Kohli’s head. He has clearly understood that anything less than the title win will bring out disappointment only. Although ODI seems quite easy for him. In Bangladesh, Kohli’s average is 122, with a total score of 732 runs with four hundreds and three fifties. As captain in eight ODIs, he averages 66.40 with a couple of centuries. This time India is going to play without the experience of MS Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh and Suresh Raina-trio which increase the pressure on Kohli’s shoulder and the bowling attack which has misfired badly in recent past has become a big test for him.
Whereas, Mathews, a year older than Kohli has the opposite spectrum of that of Kohli has. He has experienced the knowledge of several captains and Twenty20 captain. The presence of the consistent senior players like Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene make Mathew more confident about the team’s batting line up. This will make other players like Kusal Perera and Dinesh Chandimal to play freely.
On the other hand Misba who has brought Pakistan’s success in last twelve months, Pakistan won four out of five ODIs in recent past under his captaincy. And that gives Pakistan slightly favourable condition in the tournament. Though his age is being a factor against him but his experience makes him the leading scorer of Pakistan in last twelve months. His average is 53.63, and 22 of his 35 half-centuries have helped Pakistan to victory.
Mushfiqur went through a tough period because of the selection committee of Bangladesh as they chose the team without consulting him which makes him to critisize the committee hard. The last month is not a happy time for Bangladesh team as they did not bring a single victory against Sri Lankan team and at the end of that the team has been suffering from player’s injuries. Tamim Iqbal has been ruled out from the entire tournament because of his neck strain, Shakib Al Hasan has also been discard for knee injury and the absence of him will severely hurt the bowling department of the team.
The respective four captains are going to face different challanges and these will be a great chance for Nabi to learn on and off the field.
