Zahir Khan ( ps, ; born 20 December 1998) is 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 striki ...

er. He made his

Test match Test match in some sports refers to a sporting contest between national representative teams and may refer to: * Test cricket * Test match (indoor cricket) * Test match (rugby union) * Test match (rugby league) * Test match (association football) ...

debut for the

Afghanistan cricket team The Afghanistan men's national team ( ps, د افغانستان کرکټ ملي لوب‌‌‌‌‌‌ډله, fa, تیم ملی کریکت افغانستان) represents Afghanistan in international cricket. Cricket has been played in Afgha ...

in September 2019. He made his first-class debut for

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...

against

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea ( tpi, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niugini; ho, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niu Gini), is a country i ...

in the 2015–17 ICC Intercontinental Cup on 21 November 2015. He played for the Afghanistan U-19 team in the

2016 Under-19 Cricket World Cup The 2016 ICC Under-19 Cricket World Cup was an international limited-overs cricket tournament held in Bangladesh from 22 January to 14 February 2016. It was the eleventh edition of the Under-19 Cricket World Cup, and the second to be held in Ban ...

Domestic career

He made his

List A List A cricket is a classification of the limited-overs (one-day) form of the sport of cricket, with games lasting up to eight hours. List A cricket includes One Day International (ODI) matches and various domestic competitions in which the numbe ...

debut for Band-e-Amir Region in the

2017 Ghazi Amanullah Khan Regional One Day Tournament The 2017 Ghazi Amanullah Khan Regional One Day Tournament was a List A cricket competition that took place in Afghanistan from 10 to 19 August 2017. It was the first edition of the competition to be played with List A status, following the annou ...

on 10 August 2017. Along with

Karim Janat Karim Janat (born 11 August 1998) is an Afghan cricketer. He made his first-class debut against the England Lions on 7 December 2016. Prior to his first-class debut, he was part of Afghanistan's squad for the 2016 Under-19 Cricket World Cup. ...

, he was the joint-leading wicket-taker in the tournament, with twelve dismissals. He 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 innin ...

debut for

Mis Ainak Knights Mis Ainak Knights ( ps, مس عينک اتلان ''Mis Ainak Atalān'') or Mis Ainak Region is one of eight regional first-class cricket teams in Afghanistan. The region represents the following provinces in the southeast of Afghanistan, to the so ...

in the

2017 Shpageeza Cricket League The 2017 season of the Shpageeza Cricket League ( ps, شپږيزه کريکټ ليګ ۲۰۱۷), also known as SCL 5, was the fifth edition of the Shpageeza, a professional Twenty20 cricket league established by the Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB ...

on 12 September 2017. In August 2018, he joined the English side

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancashi ...

for the rest of the season. He was the leading wicket-taker 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 tournament in Afghanistan. It was the third edition of the competition to be played with first-class status. The tournament was spli ...

, with thirty dismissals in five matches.

T20 franchise career

In September 2018, he was named in Nangarhar's squad in the

first edition The bibliographical definition of an edition includes all copies of a book printed from substantially the same setting of type, including all minor typographical variants. First edition According to the definition of ''edition'' above, a b ...

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 Emira ...

tournament. In October 2018, he was named in the squad for the

Khulna Titans Khulna Tigers ( bn, খুলনা টাইগার্স) are a franchise Twenty20 cricket team representing the Khulna division in the Bangladesh Premier League (BPL), a Twenty20 cricket tournament. The franchise was owned by Gemcon Sports a ...

team, following the draft for the

2018–19 Bangladesh Premier League The 2018–19 BPL season, also known as BPL 6 or UCB BPL 2019 Powered by TVS (for sponsorship reasons), was the sixth season of the Bangladesh Premier League (BPL), the top level professional Twenty20 cricket franchise league in Bangladesh. T ...

. In 2018 he signed for the Rajasthan Royals in the Indian Premier League however he was ruled out of the season due to injury. He played for the Jamaica Tallawahs in the

Caribbean Premier League The Caribbean Premier League (abbreviated to CPL or CPLT20) is an annual Twenty20 cricket tournament held in the Caribbean. It was founded by Cricket West Indies in 2013 to replace the Caribbean Twenty20 as the premier Twenty20 competition in t ...

in 2019 and he signed for the

Brisbane Heat The Brisbane Heat are an Australian men's professional Twenty20 franchise cricket team that competes in the Big Bash League. The Heat wears a teal uniform and are based in Brisbane in the Australian state Queensland. Their home ground is the Br ...

for the

Big Bash League The Big Bash League (known as the KFC Big Bash League for sponsorship reasons, often abbreviated to BBL or Big Bash) is an Australian professional club Twenty20 cricket league, which was established in 2011 by Cricket Australia. The Big Bash Le ...

for the 2019-20 season and stated "“This is a very exciting thing for me, especially to be joining the team where my good friend Mujeeb played last year. He told me great things about Brisbane Heat, so I am looking forward to this challenge so much.” He did not resign with the Heat for the following season, and head coach

Darren Lehmann Darren Scott Lehmann (born 5 February 1970) is an Australian cricket coach and former cricketer who coached the Australian national team. Lehmann made his ODI debut in 1996 and Test debut in 1998. He was on the fringes of national selection f ...

said the following regarding his time with the club: “On behalf of the club, we really wish

Tom Tom or TOM may refer to: * Tom (given name), a diminutive of Thomas or Tomás or an independent Aramaic given name (and a list of people with the name) Characters * Tom Anderson, a character in ''Beavis and Butt-Head'' * Tom Beck, a character ...

and Zahir all the best for what lies ahead with their cricket as they both have enormous potential. . . It was great to see them display their ability and we thoroughly enjoyed having them in the squad. We hope they got plenty out of the experience." He signed for the

Melbourne Stars The Melbourne Stars are an Australian Twenty20 franchise cricket team, based in Melbourne, Victoria that competes in Australia's Twenty20 competition, the Big Bash League. The Stars wear a green uniform and play their home matches at the Melb ...

for the 2020-21 Big Bash season saying “I’m really looking forward to playing for the Stars during this BBL season. The squad is looking strong and I’d like to thank the club for giving me the chance to be part of it. Together I am sure we will build a successful season.”

International career

In December 2017, he was named in Afghanistan's squad for the

2018 Under-19 Cricket World Cup The 2018 ICC Under-19 Cricket World Cup was an international limited-overs cricket tournament that was held in New Zealand from 13 January to 3 February 2018. It was the twelfth edition of the Under-19 Cricket World Cup, and the third to be hel ...

. In January 2018, he was bought by the

Rajasthan Royals Rajasthan Royals (often abbreviated as RR) are a franchise cricket team based in Jaipur, Rajasthan, that plays in the Indian Premier League (IPL). Founded in 2008 as one of the initial eight IPL franchises, the team is based at the Sawai Ma ...

in the

2018 IPL auction This is a list of all personnel changes for the 2018 Indian Premier League. This was the third season to have all players, apart from a selection of retained players, return to the auction pool (first in 2011, second in 2014) Player retention ...

. In December 2018, he was named in Afghanistan's under-23 team for the

2018 ACC Emerging Teams Asia Cup The 2018 ACC Emerging Teams Asia Cup was the third edition of the ACC Emerging Teams Asia Cup held in Karachi, Pakistan and Colombo, Sri Lanka. Eight teams participated in the tournament including five under-23 age level teams of Test nations and ...

. In May 2018, he was named in Afghanistan's squad for their inaugural

, played against India, but he was not selected for the match. In February 2019, he was named in Afghanistan's

One Day International A One Day International (ODI) is a form of limited overs cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of overs, currently 50, with the game lasting up to 9 hours. The Cricket World C ...

(ODI) and

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 ...

(T20I) squads for their series against Ireland in India. He made his ODI debut for Afghanistan 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 ...

on 10 March 2019. Following the conclusion of the ODI series, he was added to Afghanistan's

Test Test(s), testing, or TEST may refer to: * Test (assessment), an educational assessment intended to measure the respondents' knowledge or other abilities Arts and entertainment * ''Test'' (2013 film), an American film * ''Test'' (2014 film), ...

squad, for the one-off match against Ireland, but he did not play. In August 2019, he was named in Afghanistan's

squad for their one-off match against Bangladesh. He made his Test debut for Afghanistan, in the one-off match against

Bangladesh Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million people in an area of . Bangladesh is among the mos ...

, on 5 September 2019. In May 2022, he was named as a reserve in Afghanistan's

(T20I) squad for their series against Zimbabwe. He made his T20I debut for Afghanistan against

UAE The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (The Middle East). It is located at th ...

on 19 February 2023.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Khan, Zahir 1998 births Living people Afghan cricketers Afghanistan Test cricketers Afghanistan One Day International cricketers Band-e-Amir Dragons cricketers Brisbane Heat cricketers Jamaica Tallawahs cricketers Khulna Tigers cricketers Lancashire cricketers Melbourne Renegades cricketers Melbourne Stars cricketers Mis Ainak Knights cricketers Nangarhar Leopards cricketers Quetta Gladiators cricketers Rangpur Riders cricketers Spin Ghar Tigers cricketers Saint Lucia Kings cricketers Place of birth missing (living people)