Afghanistan captain Rashid Khan wasn’t too pleased seeing his team get called the ‘second-best Asian team’ recently. He said on Thursday (October 2) that it was a tag placed on them by the media because
of their performances, but one his team never assumed for itself. He rued how people made fun of them when they exited the recently concluded 2025 Asia Cup in the group stage.
Indeed, Afghanistan was seen as one of the favorites for the competition after India, who won it. They had gathered a bit of momentum with their performances in previous multi-nation tournaments and other teams, especially Pakistan and Bangladesh, seemed to be comparatively unsettled. But Rashid’s men suffered a narrow loss to Bangladesh and a big one to Sri Lanka and failed to make it to the Super-Four round.
“There is one thing which is always going around the media, people calling us the second-best Asian team,” Rashid told the media ahead of a three-T20I rubber against Bangladesh. “We didn’t say that, but I think in the past, we performed, and that’s where we got the tag. If you look into Asia Cup, the World Cup semifinal, ODI World Cup, we have beaten big teams. Champions Trophy, we beat England. That’s why we got the tag. In the future, if we don’t perform well, we will definitely be number three, four, five, or six. I feel we haven’t given ourselves that tag,” he added.
“We are always trying our best to be a better team and to perform better on the day. Sometimes you do well, sometimes you don’t. That’s a part of the game. But your mindset should be positive in always having that hunger to perform well… They bring something to the table where people discuss it and make fun of it. And I feel like nowadays, the more you make fun of someone, the more people like you. And I feel like it’s going on a different level. And then it doesn’t look nice,” Rashid added.
Rashid explained that his team hadn’t played a lot of T20Is in the lead-up to the Asia Cup, and it showed in a lack of coherence. The bowling attack underperformed in helpful conditions, and the batting was rarely up to the speed of the competitiveness.
‘Not here to just have fun’: Rashid
The skipper added that his team are now fully focussed on building up for the next year’s T20 World Cup.
“I think every game is very competitive. It is not like we did not play competitive cricket in Asia Cup. For us, every game is competitive. We are not here just to have fun, enjoy, and then go back. We have a target, and the target is how we are going to be a perfect and balanced side for the next World Cup and that’s the mindset from now on,” Rashid said.
