This is the season of T20I internationals. Cricketing teams all around the globe are gearing up for the much anticipated ICC T20I World Cup, which is to be played in Australia later this year, and are busy forming and putting their plans in place for the fabled event. In the process to prepare for the event, Afghanistan has traveled to Zimbabwe and has played a three-match T20I series. It rather seemed to be a very easy outing for the Afghans who clinched the series by 3-0.
Afghanistan has played six limited-overs games in this series so far and before this, they have defeated Zimbabwe in the ODI series by 3-0. Team Zimbabwe has a lot of problems on their plate as they have lost all the six matches on their home turf. The Afghanistan cricket team won the final Twenty20 against Zimbabwe by 35 runs and are undefeated on this tour. Putting their bench strength to test and trying to finalize their squad for the T20 World Cup, Afghanistan handed over their debut cap to teenage left-arm spinner Noor Ahmad who claimed 4 wickets and conceded just 10 runs to strangle the opposition. The youngster straightaway announced himself on the international stage as his spell played a very pivotal role in restricting the hosts to 90/9. On the flip side, Afghanistan had scored a meager 125 for the loss of 8 wickets but Zimbabwe failed to chase it down.
Before this, Zimbabwe lost to a minnow team in Namibia and this raised a lot of eyebrows towards the approach that the board was following. As a damage control measure, Dave Houghton replaced Lalchand Rajput as Zimbabwe's coach. Houghton who is 64 years old now was Zimbabwe's captain when they played their first test match in 1992. With the T20I world cup in mind, Houghton will like to put in place a system that forces the team to improve.
(Inputs from PTI)
