It has come as a bit of a surprising call when Canada’s Hamza Tariq was shortlisted for the upcoming 2018 VIVO IPL player auctions, to be held in Bangalore on Jan 27th – 28th, 2018.
However, it shouldn’t be surprising considering he has represented a franchise partly-owned by IPL franchise, Kolkata Knight Riders, Trinbago Knight Riders in the Caribbean Premier League (CPL). In total, Hamza has played in 22 T20 matches making 192 runs at a strike rate of 109.
Hamza, Canada’s wicket-keeper batsmen has represented the country in ICC WCL divisions and is again set to take the field for Canada in the upcoming ICC WCL Division 2 in Namibia in Feb 2018. Hamza played 2 matches for Trinbago Knight Riders in 2017 CPL and made 28 runs in the 2 outings. One of the two innings were an important knock of 18(21) in the CPL final after Trinbago lost early wickets.
Hamza has also represented ICC Americas in the West Indies regional Super50 tournament. The Canadian player has had the chance to play alongside then likes of Brendon McCullum, Hashim Amla, Dwayne Bravo, Colin Munro, Sunil Narine etc in the Trinbago side.
So, it could be assumed that the Knight Riders management had some say in his inclusion in the final shortlisted players for the IPL auctions. If he gets picked, it would be a huge opportunity for Hamza to play alongside International players from the multiple times IPL winner, KKR franchise.
