Mohammad Nabi, for whom three Tests was a life's work

NICK FRIEND: In one-day cricket, Nabi will continue to dominate. As he hangs up his whites, however, he will reflect on three Tests – two wins and a single defeat. Three more Tests than, a decade ago, he could ever have imagined

Raees Ahmadzai knows what it’s like. After Afghanistan lost to South Africa at the 2010 World T20, he called it quits.

It makes him the holder of an unlikely record: the first Afghan to retire from international cricket.

He was never pushed out, but rather he chose to shuffle away from the limelight. He had made it as far as he had wished to make it. When you have grown up as Ahmadzai grew up, an Afghan in the refugee camps of Peshawar, you would never dare dream of representing your country. You didn’t truly know your country.

And thus, given the sporting miracle of the Afghanistan story – a journey fought against a tide of logic, merely being part of a global event was enough. In his final game, he edged Morne Morkel through to Mark Boucher.

“It is like life,” Ahmadzai laughs of his retirement almost a decade ago. “One day, you will be gone. For sportspeople, the best time to go is once you realise that it is the best time.

“If you want, you can help in other ways. When I announced my retirement, I didn’t feel anything bad about myself, but I never expected us to play Test cricket.

“I’m not saying that I’m jealous because I never played Test cricket, but sometimes I wish I was a young boy with the chance to play Test cricket for Afghanistan. But at that time when I took my retirement, I felt so proud of myself – given where we had started and where I was finishing.”

^{Raees Ahmadzai and Mohammad Nabi played together as Afghanistan progressed through the ICC Cricket League ladder}

Ahmadzai had been part of the squad that won the World Cricket League’s Division Five in 2008, sweeping aside cricketing nations as varied as Japan and Botswana.

Later that year, this unfathomable juggernaut would continue through Division Four; he played as Fiji were bowled out for 52, Jersey for 81 and Italy for 141. He struck a match-winning 49 in the final, seeing off the challenge of Hong Kong.

In 2009, Division Three came to Buenos Aires; Ahmadzai remained a key player – there were 78 runs in a rare losing cause at the hands of Uganda, while he remained a linchpin in wins over Argentina and the Cayman Islands.

It was an extraordinary voyage, just 10 years before Afghanistan would pull off perhaps their greatest victory to date.

There have been wins over full ICC members in the shorter formats, at World T20 tournaments and a coming-of-age month at last year’s Asia Cup.

But, little can have come close to a dominant, stirring, eye-opening dismantling of Bangladesh over the course of five days in Chittagong. Better sides than Rashid Khan’s band of Test novices have found themselves fatally mesmerised by a side that, 19 years on from its Test debut, has mastered its own conditions.

Under Rashid’s leadership, however – the result of a farcical World Cup campaign and months of captaincy upheaval, Afghanistan triumphed in a spin-centric duel.

The new skipper was palpably the man of the match – a first-innings fifty and 11 wickets in the match saw to that.

He dedicated his award, though, to Mohammad Nabi, an icon of Afghan cricket, an inspiration to associate cricketers all over the world. A man who, like Ahmadzai, was there from the very beginning; he was there in Buenos Aires, he was part of the teams that beat Bahamas, Tanzania, Jersey and Papua New Guinea.

Nabi chose Bangladesh as his last Test. Few have retired from Test cricket having only played three times. Yet, few – if any – can have followed a more roundabout path in arriving there.

If a Test career is the pinnacle for those fortunate enough to take the format for granted, then a Test debut was Nabi’s zenith. It was never so much a holy grail as an impossible dream – a feat that, once accomplished, left the allrounder with little else to achieve.

He made his international debut alongside Ahmadzai and the pair work closely with Nabi’s charitable foundation. In this unique sporting fairy-tale, the duo go way back.

^{Rashid Khan inspired Afghanistan to a famous Test victory in Bangladesh}

Ahmadzai doesn’t know his exact age – a quirk of growing up in a refugee camp, in a world without official records. Yet, he estimates that he and Nabi have known each other for close to 23 years. They mulled over his decision to retire from Test cricket together.

“In a year, we only play one or two Test matches,” Ahmadzai explains. “I discussed with him what his plan was and he was thinking about taking his retirement in the Ireland match (Afghanistan’s second Test and first win), but we discussed it some more and we decided that Bangladesh would be a good time to retire from Test cricket.

“He’s playing all the leagues around the world and he knows that if he plays all three formats, then he’ll have no chance. He knew the young generation was very good – these good players should not be on the sideline all the time. I think it was the best time for him and I’m not sure that he will feel sad for himself.”

That it ultimately ended for Nabi with eight runs and four wickets in the match was almost immaterial. He was on the field for an occasion that will go down as Afghanistan’s finest to date. Few get to choose their own retirement, fewer still are able to leave on such a wave of glory.

“Everyone wants to finish their professional life on a very high note,” Ahmadzai adds. "He’s very lucky; Bangladesh are not an easy side in their home conditions. I’m not sure that anyone in world cricket would take any chances against Bangladesh in Bangladesh.

“He will look back on it and say: ‘I’ve played three Test matches and won two. It’s a very good achievement for myself, so this is the time that I should sideline myself from Test cricket.’”

A tremendous white-ball cricketer, one suspects Afghanistan’s red-ball side will cope in his absence. On Test debut, 17-year-old Ibrahim Zadran looked in almost complete control, facing 208 deliveries in making a second-innings 87 – a vigil that ultimately set up the game. It is a view that Ahmadzai shares, even if his off-field influence will require some replacing.

“It’s like a family,” he says. “I think Rashid will not be struggling, but once your senior team member goes out of the side, you feel like you’ve lost a family member.

The pair met in Peshawar as children, playing tennis-ball cricket together whenever they could. Ahmadzai recalls his early encounters with Nabi, a young fast bowler, whose off-breaks only became part of his armory once they had returned home to Afghanistan.

“Sometimes, when those of us who have known each other for almost 25 years talk, we think it is like a movie for us,” he reminisces.

“Nobody was thinking that the time would come when we’d be travelling all over the world, playing at a high level, playing at international grounds.

“Honestly, we were not expecting that we’d have an opportunity to represent the country at a national level.

“I remember going one time with 35 Pakistani rupees in 1996 to watch the Holland and England World Cup match in Peshawar. I realised then that I wanted to play like that, that I wanted to wear a jersey like that.”

In one-day cricket, Nabi will continue to dominate. As he hangs up his whites, however, he will reflect on three Tests – two wins and a single defeat.

Three more Tests than, a decade ago, he could ever have imagined.