Bangladesh chose to bat vs Afghanistan

Bangladesh captain Shakib Al Hasan chose to bat in their opening game of the Asia Cup against Afghanistan on a well-rolled pitch in Sharjah.

Shakib, who is playing his 100th T20I, said his team was well prepared to face the Afghanistan bowlers and was looking to post a challenging total. Bangladesh fielded two frontline seamers in Taskin Ahmed and Mustafizur Rahman, and a seam-bowling allrounder in Mohammad Saifuddin to go with plenty of spin options.

Afghanistan played the same XI that beat Sri Lanka in the tournament opener in Dubai. “The morale of the team is high and we want to play the same way today,” their captain Mohammad Nabi said. A win tonight will take them into the Super 4.

Afghanistan: 1 Hazratullah Zazai, 2 Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), 3 Ibrahim Zadran, 4 Najibullah Zadran, 5 Karim Janat, 6 Mohammad Nabi (capt), 7 Rashid Khan, 8 Azmatullah Omarzai, 9 Naveen-ul-Haq, 10 Mujeeb Ur Rahman, 11 Fazalhaq Farooqi

Bangladesh: 1 Mohammad Naim, 2 Anamul Haque, 3 Shakib Al Hasan (capt), 4 Afif Hossain, 5 Mushfiqur Rahim (wk), 6 Mahmudullah, 7 Mosaddek Hossain, 8 Mahedi Hasan, 9 Mohammad Saifuddin, 10 Taskin Ahmed, 11 Mustafizur Rahman