LAHORE - Mohammad Rizwan will lead a strong Pakistan outfit in Asian Cricket Council’s eight-team Emerging Cup in Bangladesh from March 27 to April 3. The senior national selection committee headed by Inzamam-ul-Haq on Tuesday (March 21) named four players who are aged over 23 in the squad.

In what is essentially an Under-23 competition, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are allowed to include four national players, while United Arab Emirates, Afghanistan, Hong Kong and Nepal, who will be without Paras Khadka, are allowed to field their national teams.

With the Indian Premier League starting from April 5, India did not make use of the clause and named a squad, to be led by B Aparajith, where Hanuma Vihari is the only player who is over 23.

Pakistan, though, have included Bilal Asif (31), Haris Sohail (28), Hammad Azam (26) and Rizwan (24) in the team, as they seek to claim the tournament they lost to India in the final in 2013. On that occasion, Aparajith’s three-wicket haul and an unbroken second-wicket stand of 132 between KL Rahul (93 not out) and Manprit Juneja (51 not out) had helped India prevail by nine wickets.

Similarly, Bangladesh have named Nasir Hossain, Mohammad Mithun, Mominul Haque, Abul Hasan Raju, Abu Hider Rony and Mehedi Hasan Miraz in their squad. They have a combined experience of 49 Tests, 92 One-Day Internationals and 58 T20 Internationals.

Rizwan has so far played one Test, 25 ODIs and ten T20Is, and has been a regular member of the national squad in recent times. Sohail has played 22 ODIs and four T20Is, the last of which came in May 2015. He has fallen off the radar since then, unable to put up big performances in important games. Like Sohail, Azam and Asif too have not played for Pakistan since 2015. Unlike Sohail, the duo did not play a single game in the recently concluded Pakistan Super League.

The squad also includes Imam-ul-Haq, Inzamam’s nephew. Since finishing as the second-highest run-getter in the 2014 Under-19 World Cup where Pakistan lost to South Africa in the final, he has played 29 first-class matches for three centuries including an unbeaten 200. He will have for company Zafar Gohar, the left-arm spinner who was a big part of that 2014 Under-19 team and has gone on to play a solitary ODI against England in 2015.

Pakistan squad: Imam-ul-Haq, Jaahid Ali, Imran Butt, Haris Sohail, Khushdil Shah, Hussain Talat, Mohammad Rizwan (capt, wk), Bilal Asif, Usama Mir, Zafar Gohar, Sameen Gul, Ahmed Bashir, Ghulam Mudassar, Amad Butt, Hammad Azam.

Schedule

March 27: India v Sri Lanka (ZACS), Afghanistan v Malaysia (MAAS), Bangladesh v Hong Kong (SKICS-1), Pakistan v Nepal (SKICS-2)
March 28: Sri Lanka v Afghanistan (ZACS), India v Malaysia (MAAS), Pakistan v Hong Kong (SKICS-1), Bangladesh v Nepal (SKICS-2)
March 30: India v Afghanistan (ZACS), Sri Lanka v Malaysia (MAAS), Bangladesh v Pakistan (SKICS-1), Hong Kong v Nepal (SKICS-2)
April 1: First Semifinal (ZACS), Second Semifinal (MAAS)
April 3: Final (ZACS)