The six franchises of Pakistan Super League (PSL) selected their squads through a players draft on Tuesday at Islamabad for the fourth season of the blockbuster cricketing league, which will be played from February 14 to March 17.
Teams had to complete their 20-member squad, including the retained stars and supplementary players. The franchises looked to select a balanced squad with local and international talent. Karachi Kings preferred to select those international stars this time around who will visit Pakistan to play the eight scheduled games in the country.
Karachi Kings had retained all three players from the platinum category, Babar Azam, Mohammad Amir and Colin Munro, thus they did have a pick from the most elite pool of the players. Moreover, they had retained their Diamond category stars, Colin Ingram, skipper Imad Wasim and the pace sensation Usman Shinwari. They picked Sikander Raza in the Gold category, whom the owner of the franchise coined as “a great all-rounder, he is a great player, he is a good off-spinner, a good fielder and a good batsman.”
Usama Mir, Sohail Khan and Iftikhar Ahmed returned to Karachi Kings, while they picked the aggressive left-handed opening batsman Awais Zia in the Silver category. A surprise selection by the Kings is of Australia’s Aaron Summers, who is unknown to the world, but he is a tearaway fast bowler and can be the one to watch out for during the tournament. The talented leg-spinner Abrar Ahmed and the young talented cricketer Ali Imran made their way in the Emerging category.
The Supplementary picks for Karachi Kings are Ben Dunk, Aamer Yamin, Liam Livingstone and Jaahid Ali.
Karachi Kings’ squad looks fairly balanced with powerful batting line in the likes of Babar Azam, Colin Ingram, Colin Munro and Sikander Raza. Whereas, the bowling line looks extremely competent with Mohammad Amir, Usman Shinwari, Imad Wasim and Aaron Summers in the arsenal. All-rounders, Ravi Bopara and Sikander Raza provide the much-needed balance to the squad. Kings look threatening with the line-up.