Rashid Khan and Mohammad Rizwan hugged and greeted each other as Afghanistan, Pakistan players met in Dubai ahead of Asia Cup 2022.
With Asia Cup 2022 set to begin from August 27, Afghanistan and Pakistan have begun their preparations in Dubai for the showpiece event. Both sides had their first practice sessions at the ICC Academy, with players meeting and greeting each other. The Pak Board shared a video of Afghans Mohammad Nabi and Rashid Khan greeting and exchanging hugs with Shaheen Shah Afridi, Mohammad Rizwan, Haris Rauf and Fakhar Zaman.
Afghanistan will begin the tournament, facing Sri Lanka in the opener on Saturday, at the Dubai International Stadium. Meanwhile, Pakistan will face India on Sunday in their first match, in the same venue. The tournament is being hosted by Sri Lanka, but in UAE due to the economic crisis and mass protests in the island country.
Despite travelling with the team, pacer Shaheen will be missing the entire tournament due to a knee injury. Shaheen sustained the injury during the Test series against Sri Lanka and failed to recover in time. He has been replaced by Mohammad Hasnain, who has played for Pakistan in eight ODIs and 198 T20Is, but hasn’t represented the country since December 2021.
Former Pakistan captain Inzamam-ul-Haq called Shaheen’s absence ‘tough’ for Pakistan and labelled it as ‘a massive setback’.
Speaking on his YouTube channel, he said, “It’s a massive setback for Pakistan that Shaheen Afridi is out of the Asia Cup. If you look at the last match against India, he created pressure right from the very first over in the previous edition of the T20 World Cup.”