Rahmat Shah’s first squad as captain: Afghanistan name 15 for the Ireland ODIs
Fazalhaq Farooqi and Yamin Ahmadzai return, Mujeeb Ur Rahman is injured and Mohammad Nabi is unavailable, as Afghanistan pick the squad for Rahmat Shah’s opening assignment in charge.
Jul 25, 2026
Afghanistan have named a 15-man squad for their five-match one-day series in Ireland, and it is the first of the Rahmat Shah era. The batter who has spent five years as everyone else’s deputy takes the armband for the opening game at Bready on 5 August.
From vice-captain to captain
Rahmat was confirmed as Afghanistan’s Test and one-day captain on 22 July, after Hashmatullah Shahidi stepped down from the fifty-over job he had held since the start of 2022. Rahmanullah Gurbaz, the wicketkeeper, is his deputy.
It is not a leap into the unknown. Rahmat has been the vice-captain in Tests and ODIs since 2021, which is long enough to have absorbed how the dressing room works without ever having to carry the final call. He has also scored more one-day runs than any other Afghanistan batter, 4,121 of them, which tends to buy a captain time when results wobble.
What he inherits is a good side in an awkward moment. Shahidi led in 55 one-day internationals and won 27 of them, and the 2023 World Cup run that took down England, Pakistan and Sri Lanka happened on his watch. Following that is a particular kind of job. Shahidi himself stays in the squad as a batter, which should help more than it complicates.
Who is in, who is out
Fazalhaq Farooqi and Yamin Ahmadzai both come back into the pace attack, which matters for a bowling group that has looked thin whenever Farooqi has been missing. Rashid Khan is there, as is Azmatullah Omarzai. Ibrahim Zadran and Sediqullah Atal give the top order its shape alongside Gurbaz.
Mujeeb Ur Rahman misses out with injury. Mohammad Nabi is unavailable for a different reason: he is playing in the Global Super League in Guyana until 2 August, which does not leave enough runway to get to Ireland for the start of the series.
The rest of the squad reads: Darwish Rasooli, Ikram Alikhil, Nangyal Kharotai, AM Ghazanfar, Saleem Safi and Zia Ur Rahman Sharifi.
The series, and the argument around it
The first two matches are at Bready, near Magheramason, on 5 and 7 August. The series then moves to Stormont in Belfast for the last three on 10, 12 and 14 August.
Getting the fixtures onto the calendar took more debate than most bilateral series. Cricket Ireland’s board approved the tour in March after a single-issue meeting where, by the chief executive’s own account, opinion was not unanimous. Sarah Keane put it directly at the time: “I want to acknowledge up front the moral discomfort that I think we all sit with around this decision and our clear abhorrence of how the regime treats women in particular.”
Cricket Ireland went ahead anyway, told its players they would not be compelled to take part, and invited the exiled Afghanistan women’s team to play in Ireland this summer. Other boards have landed elsewhere. Cricket Australia has walked away from three bilateral series with Afghanistan since 2021 on the same grounds, starting with a one-off Test months after the Taliban returned to power. It is a live argument and it will not be settled by an ODI series in Belfast, but it is the backdrop Rahmat’s first assignment is walking into.
What Afghanistan want from it
Five one-day internationals against a full member, played in early August in Irish conditions, is exactly the kind of assignment that tells you something about a new captain. Ireland at home are awkward opponents, and swinging conditions ask different questions of a batting order built on subcontinental pitches.
Afghanistan will not want to be judged on that. They will want a settled top six and a clear plan for the 2027 World Cup in southern Africa, and Rahmat has a fortnight of cricket to start building both.