Afghanistan's fast bowler Naveen-ul-Haq expressed confidence on his team's performance in the upcoming T20 World Cup scheduled to take place in the West Indies and the United States of America (USA) in June this year.
Currently in India for a three-match T20I series against Rohit Sharma's team, Naveen highlighted Afghanistan's dominating style of play, indicating their potential success in the upcoming World Cup.
Naveen said that Afghanistan drew considerable confidence from their performance in the ODI World Cup held in India last year. Despite not progressing to the semifinals, Hashmatullah Shahidi's team turned heads by defeating Pakistan, England, Netherlands, and Sri Lanka during the tournament.
"Afghanistan are renowned for T20 cricket. Afghanistan are dominant when it comes to T20 cricket. We are high on confidence after a good show in the ODI World Cup," Naveen was quoted as saying to the Times of India before the second T20I against India on January 14 at the Holkar Stadium in Indore.
"We are sure that we will carry on the same momentum in the series (vs India) and later on in the T20 World Cup in the Caribbean and US," he added.
Naveen faced a challenging performance during Afghanistan's six-wicket loss to India at the PCA Stadium in Mohali. Ending with figures of 3.3-0-43-3, he witnessed the home team successfully chasing down a target of 159 with 15 balls to spare. Afghanistan have yet to secure a victory against India in T20Is since their first clash in 2010.
Under the captaincy of Rohit Sharma, the Indian cricket team is set to take on Ibrahim Zadran's Afghanistan in the second T20I of the three-match series at Indore's Holkar Cricket Stadium on January 14.
India vs Afghanistan: Probable playing XIs
India: Rohit Sharma (c), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Virat Kohli, Sanju Samson (wk), Tilak Varma, Shivam Dube, Rinku Singh, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Arshdeep Singh, Mukesh Kumar
Afghanistan: Ibrahim Zadran (c), Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), Rahmat Shah, Mohammad Nabi, Azmatullah Omarzai, Najibullah Zadran, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Fazalhaq Farooqi, Naveen-ul-Haq, Noor Ahmad, Qais Ahmad
(Powered by AI, Inputs by India Today)
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