Najeeb Tarakai (2 February 19916 October 2020) was an Afghan

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by str ...

er who played international cricket for the Afghanistan team. He played in twelve

Twenty20 International A Twenty20 International (T20I) is a form of cricket, played between two of the international members of the International Cricket Council (ICC), in which each team faces a maximum of twenty overs. The matches have top-class status and are the ...

matches and a One Day International fixture. Tarakai made his international debut at the

2014 ICC World Twenty20 The 2014 ICC World Twenty20 was the fifth ICC World Twenty20 competition, an international Twenty20 cricket tournament, that took place in Bangladesh from 16 March to 6 April 2014. It was played in three cities — Dhaka, Chittagong and Sylhet. ...

tournament in Bangladesh. In domestic cricket, he scored more than 2,000 runs in first-class matches. He was also part of the Afghan team that won the silver medal in the cricket tournament at the 2014 Asian Games.

Domestic career

Tarakai made his

Twenty20 Twenty20 (T20) is a shortened game format of cricket. At the professional level, it was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2003 for the inter-county competition. In a Twenty20 game, the two teams have a single inn ...

debut for the

Afghan Cheetahs The Afghan Cheetahs was a Twenty20 team established in 2011 from Afghanistan that played in Pakistan's domestic Faysal Bank Twenty-20 Cup 2011-12, Faysal Bank Twenty-20 Cup in September/October 2011. The team was captained by Mohammad Nabi and c ...

in the Faysal Bank Twenty-20 Cup against Rawalpindi Rams. He played in the Cheetahs two other fixtures in that competition, against

Faisalabad Wolves The Faisalabad Wolves was a domestic limited overs cricket team based in Faisalabad, Punjab, Pakistan. The team was established in 2004 and its home ground was Iqbal Stadium. The team were champions in the maiden season 2004–05 of the ABN- ...

and

Multan Tigers The Multan Tigers was a Pakistani Domestic T20 and List A Cricket team based in Multan, Punjab, Pakistan. The team was established in 2004 and its home ground is the Multan Cricket Stadium. The manager of the Tigers is Sheikh Saleem. Team Sq ...

. In these three matches, he scored a total of 54 runs at an

average In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7 ...

of 18.00, with a high score of 34. In September 2018, he was named in Nangarhar's squad in the first edition of the

Afghanistan Premier League The Afghanistan Premier League (APL) ( ps, ; fa, ), officially Gulbahar Afghanistan Premier League for sponsorship reasons, is a Twenty20 cricket franchise tournament run by the Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB), held in the United Arab Emirat ...

tournament. He was the leading run-scorer for Speen Ghar Region in the

2018 Ahmad Shah Abdali 4-day Tournament The 2018 Ahmad Shah Abdali 4-day Tournament was an edition of the Ahmad Shah Abdali 4-day Tournament, a cricket tournament in Afghanistan. It was the second edition of the competition to be played with first-class status. The tournament started ...

, with 719 runs in ten matches. He was also the leading run-scorer in the

2019 Ahmad Shah Abdali 4-day Tournament The 2019 Ahmad Shah Abdali 4-day Tournament was an edition of the Ahmad Shah Abdali 4-day Tournament, a cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch w ...

, with 670 runs in five matches, including four centuries in successive games.

International career

He made his debut against Bangladesh in the

tournament. He played two

(T20I) matches for Afghanistan in 2014. On 10 March 2017 against

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

, Tarakai scored 90 runs during the second T20I at

Greater Noida Greater Noida is a planned city located in Gautam Buddha Nagar district of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. The city was created as an extension to Noida area under the ''UP Industrial Area Development Act, 1976''. Situated south-east of t ...

. His match-winning performance along with the bowling performance by

Rashid Khan Rashid Khan Arman ( ps, ; born 20 September 1998) is an Afghan international cricketer and a former captain of the national team. In franchise leagues, he plays for Gujarat Titans in the Indian Premier League (IPL), Adelaide Strikers in Austra ...

, brought him his maiden man of the match award. He made his One Day International (ODI) debut for Afghanistan against Ireland at the Greater Noida Sports Complex Ground on 24 March 2017.

Death

On 2 October 2020, Tarakai sustained a severe head injury after being hit by a car while crossing a road in

Jalalabad Jalalabad (; Dari/ ps, جلال‌آباد, ) is the fifth-largest city of Afghanistan. It has a population of about 356,274, and serves as the capital of Nangarhar Province in the eastern part of the country, about from the capital Kabul. Jala ...

. He was taken to a nearby hospital in Nangarhar and subsequently underwent surgery while in a coma. He died four days later on 6 October 2020, with his death being confirmed by the Afghanistan Cricket Board.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Tarakai, Najeeb 1991 births 2020 deaths Afghan cricketers Afghan Cheetahs cricketers Afghanistan One Day International cricketers Afghanistan Twenty20 International cricketers Place of birth missing Asian Games medalists in cricket Cricketers at the 2014 Asian Games Boost Defenders cricketers Asian Games silver medalists for Afghanistan Medalists at the 2014 Asian Games Nangarhar Leopards cricketers Pedestrian road incident deaths Road incident deaths in Afghanistan Amo Sharks cricketers Spin Ghar Tigers cricketers