ILT20 2023: In a not-so-common moment in franchise cricket, Afghanistan's T20I captain Rashid Khan played for two franchises in two different leagues in a space of three days. Days after leading the MI Cape Town in South Africa's SA20, Rashid Khan featured in an eliminator game in the International League T20 for the MI Emirates. Khan, who captained MI Cape Town in the first season of SA20, helped MI Emirates to win the eliminator of the ILT20 League.
Rashid's MI Cape Town had a forgetful campaign as they finished at the bottom of the six-team points table, winning only 3 out of 10 matches. Meanwhile, MI Emirates finished third on the six-team table to make it to the playoffs and have now reached the second qualifier of the tournament. The two tournaments- SA20 and ILT20 were overlapped with their schedules and it is rare that Khan got to play for the ILT20 side. It is reported that Khan took permission from ILT20 before playing the eliminator.
MI Emirates reach Qualifier 2 after winning in eliminator
Khan, who did not feature in the previous matches for the ILT20 side, helped them to qualify for the second qualifier of the tournament. They defeated Dubai Capitals by 8 wickets on Thursday in Sharjah. Rashid took 2 wickets in the first innings, including that of a well-set Munsey and Dubai captain Yusuf Pathan. In his 4 overs, Khan gave away 20 runs, which restricted Dubai to 151/5. Riding on Nicholas Pooran and Andre Fletcher's fifties, Emirates won the match by 8 wickets. They will now face Gulf Giants in the second qualifier on February 10.
MI Emirates Playing XI:
Andre Fletcher, Muhammad Waseem, Lorcan Tucker (wk), Nicholas Pooran, Kieron Pollard (c), Dan Mousley, Dwayne Bravo, Rashid Khan, Trent Boult, Zahoor Khan, Fazalhaq Farooqi
Dubai Capitals Playing XI:
George Munsey, Robin Uthappa (wk), Ravi Bopara, Dasun Shanaka, Rovman Powell, Sikandar Raza, Yusuf Pathan (c), Jake Ball, Hazrat Luqman, Akif Raja, Reece Topley
