Afghanistan ready for the big teams, says cricket captain Nabi

National cricket team captain Mohammad Nabi said Afghanistan is ready for the “big teams” after they became the first team to qualify for the Super Four stage of the Asia Cup following victories over Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

“As a team in this Asia Cup we are showing that Afghanistan have quality batsmen, quality bowlers and quality fielders,” said all-rounder Nabi after Afghanistan thrashed Bangladesh by seven wickets on Tuesday.

“In these two games we showed we can chase totals. Earlier the opposition used to say that Afghanistan cannot chase.

“But we were quite good (in the two chases), were not under pressure and had proper balance and hopefully we do well in the next round against big teams,” Nabi said.

Afghanistan’s victory over Bangladesh in Sharjah put them into the next round of the six-nation T20 tournament.

“We are not targeting anyone, we are just playing proper cricket,” said Nabi.

The team is coached by former England batsman Jonathan Trott and ex-Pakistan fast bowler Umar Gul recently joined the team as bowling coach, AFP reported.

This new coaching team has received wide praise from the cricketing fraternity with former India fast bowler Irfan Pathan tweeting that “Afghanistan is playing some quality cricket”.

“They are on the move and teams should be wary, India or Pakistan,” former India batsman Ajay Jadeja said on Indian website cricbuzz.

“When you play these guys in the Super Four, I won’t be surprised if they knock one of the big teams off, because they have that firepower.”