CPL

Warner was a great inspiration- Afif

Z.Ahmed

Z.Ahmed
প্রকাশের তারিখ: 17:13 বৃহস্পতিবার, 23 মে, 2019

 || CF Correspondent  ||

Bangladesh’s young all-rounder Afif Hossain passed a sleepless night following his inclusion in the Caribbean Premier League after being picked by St Kitts & Nevis Patriots from the draft on May 22.

‘’I just could not sleep for a long time as I was also keeping an eye on the draft,’’ Afif told reporters while expressing his reaction at the academy lounge on Thursday.

‘’I was quite excited and after being picked it only got bigger,’’ he said.

‘’I have not played in any franchise league abroad and was watching different post [on the Face book],’’ he said.

‘’It is a big opportunity for me and would like to grab it with both hands,’’ he said.

Afif was in from in last year’s BPL. He played for the Sylhet Sixers. He scored 248 runs for them. Afif has played 30 T20 match in his career so far and in those matches he has an average of 20.66 with strike rate of 123.24. He has accumulated total 509 runs in his T20 career with two half centuries.

Afif said that he is confident to do well in CPL considering he is taking it as just another BPL.

‘’I have played BPL and to me it[ CPL] is just another T20 tournament,’’ said Afif adding that he was fortunate to share the dressing room with David Warner in the last edition.

Warner led Sixers in the BPL and was very keen follower of Afif as he believed the left handed batsman got huge potential.

Sharing the dressing room with Warner was a great lesson as he was a big inspiration for me,’’ said Afif.

‘’He taught me how to act as a professional as he used to give more than his hundred percent on the field,’’ he added.

The seventh edition of  CPL saw a surprising turnaround for Bangladesh after no one apart from Afif Hossain got a team in the daft held at the Gfinity eSports Arena in London on Wednesday.

 A total of 18 Bangladeshi players were drafted including the big names of Shakib Al Hasan, Tamim Iqbal, Mahmudullah Riyad, Mushfiqur who were the part of CPL in the last four years. The reason for their omission from this season is yet to be known.

Taskin Ahmed,  Anamul Haque Bijoy, Liton Kumer Das, Zakir Hossain, Ariful Haque,Zubair Hossain Likhon,Imrul Kayes, Mohammad Mithun, Sabbir Rahman, Abul Hasan Raju, Abu Haider Rony and Mohammad Saifuddin were the other players who were amongst the record 536 players of CPL draft.