Afghanistan skipper Hashmatullah Shahidi has hailed opener Rahmanullah Gurbaz, calling him a match-winner. Gurbaz scored a blistering knock of 80 runs off just 57 balls against England at the Arun Jaitley Stadium, Delhi on Sunday.

The right-hander played a key role in helping Afghanistan post 284 runs on the board. Gurbaz added 114 runs with his opening partner Ibrahim Zadran, who played a second fiddle and scored 28 runs off 48 balls.

The youngster played at the top of his game and adopted an aggressive approach against the English bowlers as he smashed eight fours and four sixes. In fact, Gurbaz was getting off to promising starts in the initial matches however he was finally able to convert it into a substantial score.

Gurbaz could have gone on to make a century but he sold down the river by his captain Hashmatullah Shahidi.

“See Rahmanullah is one of the players in our team who is, I believe a match-winner player. He can change the game anytime,” Afghanistan captain Hashmatullah Shahidi said in the pre-match press conference in Chennai.

“You know whenever I am talking to him also, I am telling him that you are a match winner so he put a lot of impact on the games when he doing well so he did well in the last game also unfortunately he got run out and as like I expect that he will play much more than what he did in last three games in future games so whenever he do well, automatically our team will perform well with his performance,” Shahidi added.

Meanwhile, Afghanistan’s spin duo of Mujeeb ur Rahman and Rashid Khan also played a key role in the team’s historic win of 69 runs against England. Both the spinners scalped three wickets apiece whereas Mohammad Nabi made the most of his experience to bag two scalps.

The Hashmatullah Shahidi-led team will next take on New Zealand at the MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai on Wednesday.