Australian wicketkeeper Matthew Wade, Moises Henriques and Adam Zampa have become the latest Australian players to appear in the inaugural edition of the T20 tournament in the United States. Henriques will assume the captaincy role for the Washington Freedom franchise. The 36-year-old has led the Big Bash League franchise the Sixers to back-to-back titles in 2019-20 and 2020-21. He could still be joined by two more BBL teammates, as lead-off hitter Josh Philippe and fast bowler Ben Dwarshuis are also paired with the Washington franchise for July’s tournament.
On the other hand, Australian star white-ball spinner Adam Zampa will also be joining the Kolkata Knight Riders franchise, Los Angeles Knight Riders. While Matthew Wade is another who has signed with an MLC club.
Zampa and Wade who spent the past two months at Indian Premier League outfits Rajasthan Royals and Gujarat Titans respectively.
Zampa has claimed eight wickets in six appearances for the Royals as the versatile wicket-keeper-batter has struggled to make his way into the defending champions’ playing XI. Former Indian wicket-keeper Wriddhiman Saha has kept him out of the squad for almost the entire season.
So far, Washington has announced the most number of overseas purchases of the six MLC franchises, with Henriques joining South African pair Anrich Nortje and Marco Jansen, New Zealand’s Glenn Phillips and Adam Milne, and Sri Lankan spinner Wanindu Hasaranga .
Michael Klinger, head of CNSW’s elite male cricket, is charged with leading Washington Freedom’s high-performance program and said he was “pleasantly surprised” with the quality of players in the US when he spoke to cricket.com. ouch.
“The talent is there, there is no doubt about that. There are many ex-players from the subcontinent who have played international cricket or been part of IPL franchises or PSL (Pakistan Super League) franchises,” said Klinger.
“There were players who had been in first-class systems in the subcontinent, first-class systems in South Africa who left for various reasons. So there was definitely a positive feeling about the quality that was there and that they would be able to match it as well against some of our high-quality foreign players,” Klinger concluded.
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