T20 stars like Shahid Afridi, Chris Gayle and Andre Russell to be part of Afghanistan Premier League

The tournament is set to start in October. UAE will host the league.

Afghanistan crowd | GETTY

The growing popularity of T20 cricket has given birth to various 20-over tournaments in various cricket crazy countries. Afghanistan is the newest addition to the list and they will be coming up with big names in their tournament starting from October 5.

The Afghanistan Premier League (APL) will see T20 specialists like Chris Gayle, Brendon McCullum, Andre Russell, and Shahid Afridi.

There is a total of five teams participating in the league and all of them have got a fairly equal share of quality players from the draft. Kandahar got McCullum while Gayle went for Balkh and Russell got sold to Nangarhar. Afghanistan star player Rashid Khan was picked by Kabul.

The league will see a total of 98 Afghani players. The hosts, UAE also had their seven players in the draft. 

Apart from them, there were players from the Netherlands, Scotland, Canada, Uman, Kenya, United States, Scotland, Germany, Hong Kong, Nepal, Italy, Oman, South Africa, England, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Ireland, West Indies, Zimbabwe, New Zealand, Australia, and Pakistan.

Here are the full squads from the five franchises - representing Paktia, Kabul, Balkh, Nangarhar, and Kandahar:

Paktia squad: Shahid Afridi, Thisara Perera, Mohammad Shahzad, Cameron Delport, Sharafuddin Ashraf, Samiullah Shinwari, Chris Jordan, Faheem Ashraf, Luke Wright, Amatullah Omerzai, Rahmanullah Garbaz, Zia Urhaman Akber, Calum Macleod, Tahir Adil, Yousaf Zazi, Fazal Zazai

Kabul squad: Rashid Khan, Luke Ronchi, Hazrat Zazai, Colin Ingram, Farid Malik, Javed Ahmadi, Sohail Tanvir, Laurie Evans, Wayne Parnell, Shahidullah, Muslim Musa, Afsar Khan Zazi, Muhammad Ashan Ali Khan, Zahir Shirzad, Fitrat Khawry, Usman Adil, Shawkat Zaman, Nasir Totakhil, Zamir Khan

Balkh squad: Chris Gayle, Colin Munro, Mohammad Nabi, Ravi Bopara, Aftab Alam, Gulbadin Naib, Mohammad Irfan, Ben Laughlin, Karman Akmal, Qais Ahmed, Usman Ghani, Ikrain Alikhil, Ryan ten Doeschate, Tariq Skanikai, Asadullah Matani, Samiullah Salarzai, Farhan Zakhil, Mohammad Nawaz, Darwish Rasooli

Nangarhar squad: Andre Russell, Tamim Iqbal, Mujeeb Zadran, Ben Cutting, Shafiqullah Shafaq, Najibullah Taraki, Mitchell McClenaghan, Mushfiqur Rahim, Mohammad Hafeez, Rahmat Shah, Naveen Ul Haq, Zahir Khan, Sandeep Lamichhane, Fazal Haq, Imran Janat, Nasratullah Quarishi, Khyber Omar, Ibrahim Zadran, Faal Nazai

Kandahar squad: Brendon McCullum, Wahab Riaz, Asghar Afghan, Paul Stirling, Najibullah Zadran, Karim Janat, Tymal Mills, Sam Billings, Iftkhar Ahmed, Hamza Hotak, Karim Sadeq, Sayed Shirzad, Mohammad Naveed, Waqar, Abdul Baqi, Waheed Shafaq, Waqarullah Ishaq, Nazir Jamal

 
 

By Sihyeu Singh - 11 Sep, 2018

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