Image Source- ICC
Hashmatullah Shahidi praised the talent on his
Afghanistan team during his first press conference at this World Cup. The
talent at their disposal is astounding, even outside of it. If not for the
legendary Bill Ponsford, a 23-year-old cricketer named Kunar would have became
the player to reach 1000 first-class runs the quickest. The fact is, though,
that those kinds of statistics might occasionally reveal a dearth of strong
competition. That’s been Afghanistan’s issue in the lengthier formats, to put
it briefly.
Even if their stars are highly sought after on the T20
circuit, there aren’t many opportunities for them to improve their one-day
performance. Only 29 games were played by Afghanistan between the previous
World Cup and this one. Their total is merely 153, even going back to the very
first ODI they ever played. The Indian side they will face on Wednesday has
several players who have participated in nearly twice as many games.
Batters gain this knowledge via experience, learning
when to take calculated risks, handle pressure well, and when to just have
faith in their ability to regain lost ground. Experience also enables bowlers
to understand the value of repeatedly striking the same area of the pitch.
Against Australia, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, and Ravindra Jadeja served as
examples of this. In their match against a close foe, nobody on the Afghanistan
team came close to making an impact.
ODIs require you to maintain your composure and
discipline for a far longer period of time than T20s do. Cricket amongst two
teams is the best way to understand that. But that is not truly the case in
Afghanistan. They have consistently made it to the World Cup since 2012, and
that is what they do have. It has evolved into the only purposeful means of testing
themselves. Afghanistan aspires to be like India, and tomorrow will show how
far they’ve come and how far they still have to go.
Rohit Sharma would be the ideal batting order starter
for any club in the world. But he himself doesn’t appear too content with his
situation. He believes that he is capable of more. He has been hitting them at
a rate more than a run-per-ball in ODIs for the previous two years: 114 from
eight innings in 2022 with an average of 41 and 109 from 16 innings in 2023
with an average of 47. He only has two centuries in the last three years, so
his increased aggression may have hurt his centuries column, but it also seems
to have other advantages. The only team that’s been able to score quicker than
India between the last World Cup and this one is England (98.19).
Rahmanullah Gurbaz will enjoy the surroundings in
which this game is being played. There aren’t many batters who can hit through
the line as well as him, but Delhi has given them the opportunity to.
Afghanistan has a batter at the top of the order who sets the agenda and has
access to the entire pitch. Not so long ago, he was pounding Rashid and Noor
Ahmad around on his own squad in the IPL, scoring 81 off only 39 balls.