Al-rounder Shadab Khan will lead Pakistan team as PCB announced their T20 squad for series against Afghanistan.

All-rounder Shadab Khan was chosen to captain the team in place of regular skipper Babar Azam, who has been given a rest by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), in the three-match T20 series against Afghanistan.

The announcement was made by Chief Selector Haroon Rashid and PCB Management Committee Chair Najam Sethi, who stated that the roster was finalised with the team’s future goals in mind.

Squad:

Shadab Khan, team (captain)
Shafique Abdullah
Khan, Azam
Mr. Faheem Ashraf
Ahmed Iftikhar
Ihsanullah
Wasim Imad
Muslim Haris
Nawaz Muhammad
Junior Mohammad Wasim
Shah, Naseem
Ayub Saim
SM Tayyab Tahir Shan
Khan, Zaman
The three-match set will be contested in Sharjah between March 24 and 27.

This will be the first bilateral series between Afghanistan and Pakistan; in multi-nation competitions, the two teams have faced each other in three T20 Internationals and four ODIs, although no team has won to far.

Ihsanullah, Ayub, Tahir, and Zaman are the four uncapped players in the newly-announced team.

Babar Azam, Fakhar Zaman, Haris Rauf, Mohammad Rizwan, and Shaheen Shah Afridi have all been rested, according to a statement from the PCB. During the selection process, Asif Ali, Haider Ali, Mohammad Hasnain, and Khushdil Shah were all unable to reach the final team.

It is important to note that the aforementioned nine players were a part of the Pakistani team that defeated England in Australia to get to the 2022 ICC Men’s T20 World Cup final.

Sethi, in the meantime, congratulated Shadab on his new position.

Shadab Khan has served as Pakistan’s vice-captain in white-ball cricket for a number of years, so it seems sense that he will lead the team for the brief three-match T20I tour to Sharjah in Babar Azam’s absence, according to a PCB high-up.

Also, he told the media that Mohammad Yousuf, a previous great, had been retained as the batting coach “to maintain consistency” in the forthcoming series.

Haroon Rashid provided an explanation of the reasoning for the new selections, stating that the board adhered to the customary rotation strategy by giving the top performers a break and giving high-performing local players the chance to showcase their talent and promise on a global stage.

As we look forward to putting together and getting ready for a formidable side for next year’s T20 World Cup in the West Indies and the United States, this will also allow us to test the temperament and skills of these players and help us strengthen our pool of players, he said at a press conference.

In order to win the series against a strong Afghanistan team, he asked that the selection committee make sure that the team it chose was equally as good and capable of doing so.

He said that seven players from the prior series had been kept in order to balance the roster.

In order to allow them to finish their recuperation, the top selection said that Babar, Fakhar, Haris, Rizwan, and Shaheen had “given pauses” from the brief Sharjah series.

This will enable them to refocus, reassemble, and recharge so that they are completely prepared for the difficulties of the difficult 2023–24 season, according to Rashid.