Gulf Giants have strengthened their squad by adding four homegrown players from UAE. Earlier, the Giants had included leading T20 names like Australia's Chris Lynn, West Indies' Shimron Hetmyer, England's James Vince and Chris Jordan in their squad for the inaugural edition of the International League T20 (ILT20).
The likes of David Wiese, Tom Banton, Dominic Drakes are also among the other names, who are part of the squad.
The team has now added four new homegrown players from UAE. Chundangapoyil Puthiyapurayil Rizwan is an Indian-born cricketer, who has been playing for the United Arab Emirates national cricket team since 2019. He was also appointed as the captain for the national team in August 2022.
Speaking on his inclusion in the team, Rizwan said in a statement, "It is exciting to be a part of any of the big franchise tournaments, and the ILT20 has big plans to be a major franchise tournament that is also promoting UAE-based cricket player participation. I am looking forward to the tournament and giving my 100 per cent."
The second player to be added to the team is Aayan Afzal Khan. Aayan is an all-rounder from UAE who played his first ICC T20 World Cup game at 16 years and 335 days. He created history by becoming the youngest player to feature in an ICC T20 World Cup match.
Another young dynamic talent is Sanchit Sharma. Sanchit is an Indian-born cricketer, who plays for the UAE national cricket team. In October 2021, he was named in the UAE's Twenty20 International squad for the 2021 Summer T20 Bash tournament. He made his T20I debut in October 2021 for the UAE against Ireland. Before his T20I debut, he was named in the UAE's squad for the 2020 Under-19 Cricket World Cup.
Lastly, the team has added Ashwanth Valthappa. He has played 217 matches and has 3,700 runs to his name at a strike rate of 126.58 and an average of 27. On the bowling front, he has 41 wickets to his name with the best figure of 3/13.
Andy Flower, the head coach of the team, said, "One of the reasons a nation hosts a franchise cricket tournament is to grow the game in its own country and we are very proud to announce the addition of four enterprising young UAE cricketers to our brand-new team Gulf Giants in the ILT20. We look forward to them contributing significantly to our success in January and to the future success of UAE cricket on the world stage."
International League T20 (ILT20) is a top-level professional Twenty20 cricket league tournament in the United Arab Emirates, organized by the Emirates Cricket Board (ECB). It will start from January next year.
( With inputs from ANI )
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