Afghanistan Pacer Naveen Ul Haq, who is currently on duty with the national team for a 3-match T20I series in India, has shown confidence that his team will be able to put up a dominant performance in the upcoming ICC T20 World Cup 2024 in the US. .and West Indies, starting June 1.
Naveen Ul Haq has been one of Afghanistan’s main men on the field and has played a key role in the team’s good performances in the recent past, especially during the ICC Cricket World Cup last year in India. He played all the matches in the Afghanistan league stage and took 8 wickets in the competition.
In fact, while Afghanistan’s performance in the 50-over World Cup attracted attention, everyone was quite surprised to see their drastic improvements as an ODI team. They were a good T20 team but doubts lingered over their capabilities in the longer format, but all that was ignored last October.
Unlike their first two World Cup appearances in 2015 and 2019, when they won just one match in the Australian edition, Afghanistan went toe-to-toe with the big boys. Win against England, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka and the extremely close fight against eventual champions Australia showed exactly why they are slowly becoming a major power and how far head coach Jonathan Trott has taken the team.
But their favorite format is the shortest and no one can deny the fact that T20s are Afghanistan’s breeding ground. The success of Afghan players with their national team is directly related to their active participation in T20 franchise leagues around the world.
24-year-old pacer Naveen Ul Haq reminded everyone that Afghanistan has been a dominant force in the format and Afghanistan will shine in the 20-team World T20 and produce their best performance in an ICC event so far.
“Afghanistan is famous for T20 cricket. We are a dominant force when it comes to the shorter format. “We are very confident after a good show in the ODI World Cup.” – said Naveen Ul Haq.
“We are very confident and we will build on this momentum,” says Naveen Ul Haq
As Afghanistan will try to come back in the second T20I in Holkar after losing the first match in Mohali, all eyes will be on Virat Kohli-Naveen Ul Haq’s face that started in the 2023 IPL but the first one ended when India hosted the World Cup.
Looking ahead to the second T20, Naveen has stated that the team is very confident after their WC 2023 campaign and they are trying to replicate it in this series as well as the World Cup in June.
“We are confident that we will maintain the same momentum in the series and later in the T20 World Cup in the Caribbean and the United States.” – Naveen Ul Haq concluded.
