In one of those surprise moves, the Afghanistan Cricket Board has sacked Asghar Afghan from the captaincy ahead of the ICC World Cup 2019. Meanwhile, Rashid Khan expressed his disappointment for the call taken by the selectors ahead of such a big event.
On Friday, Afghanistan Cricket Board removed Asghar Afghan as captain from all formats. They replaced him with Gulbadin Naib (ODIs), Rahmat Shah (Tests) and Rashid Khan (T20s).
The move came just a month before the ICC World Cup 2019 gets underway in England and Wales with the squad for the tournament to be announced over the course of April.
Asghar Afghan was highly instrumental in Afghanistan success:
Meanwhile, Rashid Khan expressed his disappointment. In a couple of tweets, Rashid Khan quoted that he strongly disagrees to the call taken by the selection committee. He feels that the team has gelled really well under the captaincy of Asghar Afghan.
With all the respect to the Selection Committee, I strongly disagree with the decision as it is irresponsible & bias. As we have
@cricketworldcup in front of us, Captain#MAsgharAfghan should remain as our team Captain. His captaincy is highly instrumental for team success .
Further, he went on to add saying that the call was bias and irresponsible. Rashid Khan believes that Asghar Afghan was one of the crucial factors behind the success of Afghanistan in the recent past. Removing him from captaincy ahead of such a mega event will hurt the team.
”With just months to go for such a mega event like World Cup, changing the captain will cause uncertainty and also team morale will be affected,” he added.
Asghar Afghan was appointed as the captain of Afghanistan back in April 2015. Afghanistan posted 31 wins in ODIs and they also registered 37 victories in 46 T20Is. He also led his country to victory in the ICC World Cup qualifiers, which paved them a way to head into the ICC World Cup 2019.
Well, it would be interesting to see whether Afghanistan selection committee considers the plea made by their superstar Rashid Khan. If they continue with Gulbadin Naib, it would be tricky for them going into such a big event.