When your country has just been accepted as a Test nation, you have qualified for the next ODI World Cup and you have one of the most exciting young bowlers in world cricket – Rashid Khan – others might be overshadowed.
But here’s one name everyone should be following immediately, because Mujeeb Ur Rahman may well be even better than Khan – and he has only just turned 17.
Mujeeb is what people like to call the ‘mystery spinner’. He flicks and thrusts the ball at the batsmen via a mix of traditional finger and wrist spin, then the unconventional finger rips, which sends the ball in a completely different direction and trajectory.
He is fascinating to watch go about his work, and just trying to decipher what he is bowling each ball watching on television is difficult enough. Being a batsman facing him must be a nightmare.
I first saw him in the recent Under 19 World Cup in New Zealand, where he tore apart the home team in their quarter-final match, taking 4-14 from 8.1 overs, bowling out the Kiwis for 107. None of the batsmen had any idea where the ball was going.
He had a tougher time in the semi-final against Australia, but his 1-45 from 9.3 overs was still admirable, as his team tried to defend just 181 runs.
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He then joined up with the Afghanistan senior team in their effort to qualify for next year’s World Cup, where Rashid Khan and Mohammed Nabi turned up as the big names.
Afghanistan made a remarkable recovery, after barely getting into the Super Six competition, to eventually win the qualifying tournament, defeating the West Indies twice along the way and ensuring their place in England next year.
Nabi and Rashid were good. Nabi took eight wickets at 34.37, and Rashid took 14 wickets at 21.35. It is easy to forget Khan is only 19 himself, such has been his international rise over the last 18 months. He isn’t the second-ranked bowler in ODIs and top-ranked bowler in international T20s for nothing.
By comparison, young Mujeeb finished as Afghanistan’s highest wicket-taker for the tournament, taking 16 at an average of 15.93, and an economy rate of 3.75. In the two matches against the West Indies, he took 3-33 off ten overs, then in the final took 4-43 from 9.5 overs when the pressure to perform was at its highest.
Two days after his match-winning performance against New Zealand, Mujeeb was picked up by Kings XI Punjab for the Indian Premier League for an incredible $US630,000 – he had yet to turn 17.
He played his first match this week for Kings XI in a losing cause, bowling four tidy overs, conceding just 28 runs, and picking up two wickets – defeating Colin Munro who had reverted to the reverse sweep early when it appeared he could not pick his deliveries, and deceiving Rishabh Pant with flight and spin to have him caught by Andrew Tye.
I will be watching Mujeeb in this season’s IPL carefully, to see how he reacts under pressure and what he learns from the experience.
Then I look forward to hopefully seeing such a mature head on such young shoulders play in Afghanistan’s first-ever Test match, against India in a few months’ time.
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