A cheeky Rashid Khan believes more people will be barracking for him at the Adelaide Oval on Friday night than for an Australian side desperately attempting to keep their Twenty20 World Cup title defence hopes alive.
“I think it’s more a home game for me than the Australian team,” the Afghanistan and Adelaide Strikers leg-spin star told the Herald and The Age after training on Thursday. “I’ve played enough cricket here the last five years in the Big Bash.
“I’m absolutely super happy to be back here and looking forward to the game. I think mostly people will be [cheering] for me.”
The best short form bowler on the planet, Rashid has an imposing home ground advantage that will make life very different for an Australian team which needs the stars to align for a path to the semi-finals.
Australia must win by at least 60 runs to overcome England’s run rate. If they do not, the hosts must hope for an upset in one of the two other group matches. Either Ireland must beat New Zealand in the early game at Adelaide Oval or Sri Lanka must upset England in Sydney on Saturday night, where the conditions could favour Sri Lanka’s spinners.
Rashid believes Australia will most likely need to force the pace, which could play into his hands.
Rashid Khan celebrates after dismissing Sri Lanka’s Kusal Mendis.Credit:Getty
“That’s something which is a plus point for us – we know that they’re going to come harder at us,” he said.
Afghanistan may be playing their first match at Adelaide Oval, but Rashid has turned out there 29 times for the Strikers, where he’s taken the second most BBL wickets at the venue behind his Strikers teammate, Peter Siddle.
And while Rashid has a strong affinity with the ground, Australia are not expected to have a South Australian or Strikers player in their team. The only local player in the 15-man squad, seamer Kane Richardson, is very much a back-up bowler who is yet to play in the tournament.
And Australia have contributed to Rashid’s armory. As part of the wider leg-spinning fraternity, he spent some time with Australia’s most successful T20 bowler, Adam Zampa.
Adelaide Striker star Khan is the No.1 T20 bowler in the world.Credit:Getty Images
“A couple of years back I had that time in the middle of the ground in Sydney,” Rashid recalled. “You share the experience, and the way he has been performing from the last three years, it has been amazing.”
So which of leg spin’s dark arts did they discuss?
“We talked about the run-up. We discussed what makes a difference,” he said. “Also a bit of sharing of using the wrist, using the fingers. The grip you hold for leg spin, the grip you hold for the wrong ’un. And I wanted to bowl the slower leggie, so we discussed that as well.”
In contrast to Rashid, Australia’s bowlers are largely T20 foreigners in Adelaide. Josh Hazlewood, fourth on the T20 rankings, has played just two BBL matches at Adelaide, for Sydney Sixers, and no internationals, while Mitchell Starc’s only T20 game was for Australia against Sri Lanka three years ago.
“You understand you know what is the right score on these wickets, what should be the mindset as a batsman, what should be the mindset of the bowler,” Rashid said of his home ground advantage.
Rashid can be a particularly difficult bowler to face because while he may look like a traditional leg-spinner with a cocked wrist, he spins the ball off his fingers rather than rolling his wrist, so he can make the ball spin either way with little variation in his wrist angle.
“That’s how it’s pretty different than other leg spinners,” he said. “I use the top of my fingers rather than the wrist and that is something which makes it different, and I produce the pace as well.”
As a result, Rashid bowls relatively quickly for a leg-spinner, making it harder for batsmen to come down the wicket at him. His accuracy means that batsmen who do come after him usually have to hit straight down the ground towards the long Adelaide Oval boundaries.
Rashid has played for 27 different teams at home and around the world, adding to his significant experience, but has never played an international fixture at home given Afghanistan’s unsettled nature.
“It’s something which you can never think about,” he said. “We all have that hope that one day it does happen and you play the international game in your own country. “I hope it does happen in future and during my cricket.”
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