The future's bright, the future's Zazai

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At the turn of the century, I’d probably have laughed in the face of anyone who told me that Afghanistan, a country that has spent a large part of its recent history caught up in various conflicts, would be the up and coming force in one of the world’s most popular sports.

However, here I am in 2021 watching its latest young T20 star in the form of Hazratullah Zazai battering the best that the Pakistan Super League (PSL) has to offer to all corners of its adopted home in Abu Dhabi.

Zazai has just scored 77 off 38 balls against a Karachi Kings bowling attack that includes the international quality of Mohammad Amir and Imad Wasim to lead his Peshawar Zalmi side to a 2nd eliminator match and just 1 win from the final.

Equally, this innings was no one-off fluke from the powerful left-hander who came into the match having already hit 63 from 26 balls against the same opposition earlier in the tournament not to mention the 162 he struck against Ireland in a T20i a couple of years an innings that is 2nd only to Aaron Finch’s knock in the all-time high score stakes and which contained more maximum’s than any other player has managed in short form innings.

Critics might say that it’s one thing doing it against Ireland and another to do it against higher quality opposition and that would be a fair point. From what I've seen from Zazai in these last couple of weeks is you pitch on a length or just full of length then the ball is going to disappear back over your head but where he is perhaps vulnerable is to the short-pitched ball either at pace or cutters dug into the surface forcing him to play cross-batted shots with which he struggles to generate quite so much power.

But boy when he does connect with the ball it stays hit! Of the 9 maximums he's hit in the 3 games he's played in the PSL, the vast majority haven't just plopped over the boundary ropes, they've sailed into and sometimes beyond the stands suggesting that he has the power to hit sixes on any ground, in any tournament in the world.

To date, Zazai has plied his trade in the third tier of T20 leagues in places like Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and his native Afghanistan. However, with the PSL having been postponed at the halfway point this Spring and only able to return this month in a new location, Zazai got his big break with a number of more established stars either opting not to travel for the rescheduled and relocated PSL or otherwise having moved onto other leagues around the world that are taking place at the same time.

Indeed this type of opportunism, of making the most of a bad situation is what typifies Afghan cricket as a whole. After all, it was as a result of a large number of Afghan refugees moving across the border into Pakistan that cricket really took hold in the country. Now with so many big-name players from the likes of Australia, England and the West Indies either being unable or unwilling to take part in the PSL, Zazai and his fellow Afghans have arrived to fill the void and you might argue are having more of an impact than some of the more established household names they've replaced.

Of course, Zazai is hardly the first T20 star we’ve seen who hails from Afghanistan with the world’s number 1 ranked short-form bowler in Rashid Khan one of the most prized assets on the franchise circuit these days. In fact, at 23 years old Zazai is something of an old timer versus the likes of Rashid who debuted for his country just after his 17th birthday and despite feeling like he’s been around forever is in fact still a year younger than Zazai.

However, both men are senior citizens compared to left-arm chinaman bowler Noor Ahmad who also played in last night's match albeit on the losing side for Karachi Kings and who first came to the world's attention when he turned out for Melbourne Renegades in this year's BBL at the age of 15!

The future then appears to be bright not just for Zazai but for Afghan cricket in general who have established a solid conveyor belt of young talent coming through their ranks. Indeed Afghanistan are now the blueprint for success that the ICC must build on to further the spread of the sport outside its traditional Commonwealth strongholds.

The next big hope in that regard is considered to be Nepal who also benefit from geographical proximity to cricketing powerhouses India and Pakistan but who will be bitterly disappointed to have missed out on qualification for this year's T20 World Cup which unlike the 50 over version has been extended to give associate nations a chance to demonstrate their progress against the big boys.

In that regard, we will see the likes of the Netherlands and Scotland who both have a number of well-known county players in their squad as well as lesser-known sides from Oman, Namibia and even Papa New Guinea competing in the World Cup this October. It's tempting to suggest that these last 3 teams are there to "make up the numbers" but I can imagine that the Afghanistan squad will have a genuine ambition to make a splash in this year's tournament.

The T20 format is changing the way that cricket is played and also viewed around the world. As with most change some of it tends to be good and others less desirable but the ability to fast track success in areas where cricket hasn't previously been well established is definitely one of the better outcomes of its creation and leagues like the PSL, IPL and BBL offer players from these nations a chance to make life-changing money that a couple of decades ago didn't exist and was, therefore, a real obstacle in getting athletes from non-Test playing nations to turn their hand at the game.

Indeed, I'd be surprised if Zazai's performances haven't turned a few heads in England and with the PSL finishing on Thursday who's to say whether a county side might take a punt on him for the later part of the T20 Blast. Thereafter, he and his young Afghan colleagues will surely be hoping that performances in the World Cup can put them in a prime position to claim the ultimate prize of a contract in the IPL which this year is set for an expansion and super auction meaning that there will be some big money going into the pockets of a few lucky cricketers, could one of them be Zazai?



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The one thing the new format has done is bought youngsters to the fore. The older players tend to struggle that 10 an over is par which it will be in a few years time. Happy to see the Afghans being recognized and taking their opportunities. Watched some of the PSL last night and how bad was the catching?

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Yeah the quality of the PSL is not quite that of the IPL those dropped catches in the last over were horrendous. I actually thought Karachi had a chance to snatch the game in the final over certainly if they’d have taken the catch off the first ball it would have cranked up the pressure.

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