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| Nepal VS Afghanistan in T20 World Cup 2012 |
After 3 close games against Sri Lanka, England and South Africa and a historic six-run victory over the mighty West Indies at the Super 10 stage of ICC T20 World Cup 2016, Afghanistan has earned a handful of admirers over the cricket world. Surely their stunning performance had nothing to do with luck. The victory over the tournament champions West Indies was a well-deserved one and with a little bit of refinement they might have won against Sri Lanka and England.
As a Nepali Cricket fan, it is great to see that an associate cricket team can imply such an impact in a World Cup event. Now that Afghanistan has done it, it is time for other growing associate nations too to follow the footsteps and leave a mark in the cricket world. Among many lessons here are the 5 most important ones that Nepali Cricket can learn from Afghanistan’s brilliant performance in the T20 World Cup 2016.
- Having a bold mentality
If there is one thing that everyone has noticed in Afghanistan’s side this tournament it is their boldness. Ever since they started their World Cup campaign they made it clear to everyone that they were not there just to fulfill the team quota but to win games regardless of who the opponent was. And this mentality was the main factor which helped them to qualify for the Super 10 rounds throwing a test playing nation, Zimbabwe behind. The approach for Super 10 was no different, they were bold and fearless against England, Sri Lanka, South Africa and West Indies too which resulted in 3 very close defeats and a well-deserved victory.
- Sense of responsibility
In an interview with an Indian newspaper “The Hindu” Afghanistan’s bowling coach Prabhakar said, “Earlier, they used to play for fun. They were not answerable for their performances. Now they have become answerable. Inzy bhai [Inzamam-ul-Haq, Head Coach] and I wanted to ensure that.” This shows that a sense of responsibility has risen among the players; they have started to take their games more seriously. This can be seen in their individual performances during the world cup. In their first game against Scotland Mohammad Shahzad and skipper Asghar Stanikzai scored 61 and 55 runs respectively helping the “Blue Tigers” put a total of 170. Meanwhile, in the next game against Hong Kong the bowling unit performed, Hamid Hassan bowled 4 overs and conceded just 17 runs while Mohammad Nabi and Rashid Khan gave away 20 and 23 runs respectively both bowling 4 overs and restricting their opponent below 118. When it came to the big game against Zimbabwe the whole team performed. The batsmen did their job well first by putting a total of 186 runs on the board which included impressive contributions from Mohammad Shahzad (40), Samiullah Shenwari (43) and Mohammad Nabi (52). The bowling side then defended the total very impressively by dismissing the whole Zimbabwean squad for 127 at 19.4 over. Similar performance was again displayed from Afghanistan at the super 10s.
- Passion in the game
Playing a game in one thing, playing a game passionately is a different story. When you involve your passion in the game you are ready to do anything to win it. Throughout the World Cup, Afghanistan played every single game passionately. They were hungry to win games and show the world their potential. This is what made them bold and fearless in the first place. If you have seen any of their matches you could see the aura of passion coming from Afghan players. You could see the pacer, Hamid Hassan, painting Afghanistan flag on the face and coming to play showing the love he has for the team. You could see the keeper, Mohammad Shahzad, jumping and dancing on the ground. You could see the whole squad celebrating after they won against West Indies at the Super 10 stage. These are the things that keep you motivated on the game which ultimately generates a belief in you that you can beat anyone.
- The Cricket Board
Although Afghanistan and Nepal both are young teams in cricket, Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) is much matured and dedicated to developing in comparison to Cricket Association Nepal (CAN) which is suffering from the internal dispute and dirty politics. This matureness and dedication from ACB boosted the morale of the whole team. ACB is so dedicated to developing their cricket team that they signed a 2 years contract for the stadium at Noida, India. All the home games of Afghanistan will be played there for next 2 years. Meanwhile, CAN has failed miserably to develop their cricket. In fact, Nepal’s national team does not even own a decent stadium. The only home ground of Nepal Cricket Team, i.e. TU Ground at Kirtipur, had recently failed ICC’s quality test for the World Cricket League. This unstable state of CAN will only push Nepali cricket further into darkness.
- Strong junior and domestic cricket structure
One of the reasons Afghanistan is able to produce such quality players is that they have extremely well structure set up for junior-level cricket. In junior school level (Class 5 – 8) the students are taught the basics of cricket and are exposed to competitive cricket through intra-school competitions. Then there are inter-school tournaments for secondary school level (Class 8-10) and high school level (Class 10 – 12). ACB has set up a very well structured domestic cricket too, where games are played on regular basis. Such well-established cricket foundation will, of course, generate quality players for Afghanistan. We saw in the recent world cup the 16 years old Rashid Khan was very impressive. On the flip side, Nepal has no cricket structure set up for school level. All Nepal has are some private cricket academy where they allow practicing cricket. Even though CAN has set up an academy called National Cricket Academy (NCA) at Kirtipur but it isn’t much effective. The domestic cricket in Nepal is very irregular and involves lots of politics which show no sign of improvement. Even in such chaos Nepal is able to generate some quality players recently like Sandeep Lamichane, Siddharth Lohani and Sompal Kami.
Nepal has a lot to learn from teams like Afghanistan, Ireland, Netherlands and Scotland. In the past Nepal has shown lots of promise and it is no doubt that Nepal has the quality to participate in ICC’s World Events. The things they lack are experience and a strong support from their cricket board. Recently the Himalayan nation has gone through a huge turmoil with 2 back to back strong earthquakes just before T20 World Cup qualifiers and national dispute leading to economical blocked. This too has contributed in slowing down the development of cricket in Nepal. But now the country has to move on and take their cricket seriously. Hopefully, one day we might see them giving tough competition to test playing nations like Afghanistan did this World Cup.
If there is one thing that everyone has noticed in Afghanistan’s side this tournament it is their boldness. Ever since they started their World Cup campaign they made it clear to everyone that they were not there just to fulfill the team quota but to win games regardless of who the opponent was. And this mentality was the main factor which helped them to qualify for the Super 10 rounds throwing a test playing nation, Zimbabwe behind. The approach for Super 10 was no different, they were bold and fearless against England, Sri Lanka, South Africa and West Indies too which resulted in 3 very close defeats and a well-deserved victory.
- Sense of responsibility
In an interview with an Indian newspaper “The Hindu” Afghanistan’s bowling coach Prabhakar said, “Earlier, they used to play for fun. They were not answerable for their performances. Now they have become answerable. Inzy bhai [Inzamam-ul-Haq, Head Coach] and I wanted to ensure that.” This shows that a sense of responsibility has risen among the players; they have started to take their games more seriously. This can be seen in their individual performances during the world cup. In their first game against Scotland Mohammad Shahzad and skipper Asghar Stanikzai scored 61 and 55 runs respectively helping the “Blue Tigers” put a total of 170. Meanwhile, in the next game against Hong Kong the bowling unit performed, Hamid Hassan bowled 4 overs and conceded just 17 runs while Mohammad Nabi and Rashid Khan gave away 20 and 23 runs respectively both bowling 4 overs and restricting their opponent below 118. When it came to the big game against Zimbabwe the whole team performed. The batsmen did their job well first by putting a total of 186 runs on the board which included impressive contributions from Mohammad Shahzad (40), Samiullah Shenwari (43) and Mohammad Nabi (52). The bowling side then defended the total very impressively by dismissing the whole Zimbabwean squad for 127 at 19.4 over. Similar performance was again displayed from Afghanistan at the super 10s.
- Passion in the game
Playing a game in one thing, playing a game passionately is a different story. When you involve your passion in the game you are ready to do anything to win it. Throughout the World Cup, Afghanistan played every single game passionately. They were hungry to win games and show the world their potential. This is what made them bold and fearless in the first place. If you have seen any of their matches you could see the aura of passion coming from Afghan players. You could see the pacer, Hamid Hassan, painting Afghanistan flag on the face and coming to play showing the love he has for the team. You could see the keeper, Mohammad Shahzad, jumping and dancing on the ground. You could see the whole squad celebrating after they won against West Indies at the Super 10 stage. These are the things that keep you motivated on the game which ultimately generates a belief in you that you can beat anyone.
- The Cricket Board
Although Afghanistan and Nepal both are young teams in cricket, Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) is much matured and dedicated to developing in comparison to Cricket Association Nepal (CAN) which is suffering from the internal dispute and dirty politics. This matureness and dedication from ACB boosted the morale of the whole team. ACB is so dedicated to developing their cricket team that they signed a 2 years contract for the stadium at Noida, India. All the home games of Afghanistan will be played there for next 2 years. Meanwhile, CAN has failed miserably to develop their cricket. In fact, Nepal’s national team does not even own a decent stadium. The only home ground of Nepal Cricket Team, i.e. TU Ground at Kirtipur, had recently failed ICC’s quality test for the World Cricket League. This unstable state of CAN will only push Nepali cricket further into darkness.
- Strong junior and domestic cricket structure
One of the reasons Afghanistan is able to produce such quality players is that they have extremely well structure set up for junior-level cricket. In junior school level (Class 5 – 8) the students are taught the basics of cricket and are exposed to competitive cricket through intra-school competitions. Then there are inter-school tournaments for secondary school level (Class 8-10) and high school level (Class 10 – 12). ACB has set up a very well structured domestic cricket too, where games are played on regular basis. Such well-established cricket foundation will, of course, generate quality players for Afghanistan. We saw in the recent world cup the 16 years old Rashid Khan was very impressive. On the flip side, Nepal has no cricket structure set up for school level. All Nepal has are some private cricket academy where they allow practicing cricket. Even though CAN has set up an academy called National Cricket Academy (NCA) at Kirtipur but it isn’t much effective. The domestic cricket in Nepal is very irregular and involves lots of politics which show no sign of improvement. Even in such chaos Nepal is able to generate some quality players recently like Sandeep Lamichane, Siddharth Lohani and Sompal Kami.
Nepal has a lot to learn from teams like Afghanistan, Ireland, Netherlands and Scotland. In the past Nepal has shown lots of promise and it is no doubt that Nepal has the quality to participate in ICC’s World Events. The things they lack are experience and a strong support from their cricket board. Recently the Himalayan nation has gone through a huge turmoil with 2 back to back strong earthquakes just before T20 World Cup qualifiers and national dispute leading to economical blocked. This too has contributed in slowing down the development of cricket in Nepal. But now the country has to move on and take their cricket seriously. Hopefully, one day we might see them giving tough competition to test playing nations like Afghanistan did this World Cup.
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