Afghanistan Head Coach Jonathan Trott has said that he doesn’t know if Rashid Khan will play in the last game of the series against Sri Lanka on June 7 at Hambantota. Sri Lanka evened the series by beating the foreigners by a large margin (132 runs) on Sunday.
Rashid was ruled out of the first two games of the series because of a back problem, but Trott said on Sunday that they won’t make a decision about him until they look at his state before the third game.
Rashid may or may not be able to play in the do-or-die game. Trott said, “We’ll just check his fitness and see how his back feels, and then you’ll know when the team is announced on Wednesday.”
Trott said that Afghanistan’s bad start with the ball and their giving up too many runs at the end were the main reasons why they lost. “I think we didn’t start out well enough with the ball, and we weren’t consistent enough in the middle overs. They scored 109 runs in the last 10 overs, which isn’t great,” he said.
“You didn’t do much right if you lost a 50-over game by more than 100 runs. So that’s where we are and what we need to get better at before the next game.
“We have a day off tomorrow and practice on Tuesday. The game was on Wednesday, so it’s all about the process and getting it out of your mind so you can focus on the next game, which I am sure will be a very good game,” he said.
Trott thinks that Afghanistan wasn’t aggressive during the run chase and didn’t put enough pressure on the Sri Lankan attack. Afghanistan needed 324 runs to win, but after 30 overs, they only had 144. “With the bat, it was clear we were behind,” he said. “Chameera came in and bowled pretty well, and I think we let them bowl well at times. We may not have put enough pressure back on the Sri Lankan bowlers when chasing that target, so that’s what we need to work on for the next game.”
