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Abdul Malik is a promising right-handed opening batsman who plays for the Afghanistan cricket team and made his international debut in March 2021. Malik made his first-class debut for Amo Region in the 2017/18 Ahmad Shah Abdali 4-day Tournament. He had a poor start to his domestic career, scoring just 2 runs and getting out for a first-ball duck in the second innings of the match. Two years later he made his List-A debut for Amo Region in the 2019 Ghazi Amanullah Khan Regional One-Day Tournament. Just like his first-class debut, Malik struggled to create a good impression on the selectors and was dismissed for just 2 runs. In November 2019, the Baghlan-born was named in the Afghanistan squad for the U-23 Emerging Teams Asia Cup Tournament. Post the 2019 Emerging Asia Cup, Malik continued to represent Amo Region in the domestic competitions and has done fairly well at the top of the order. The youngster was a surprise call-up in the Afghanistan squad for the Test series against Zimbabwe in 2021. In the first Test match of the series, Malik became the first batsman for Afghanistan to be dismissed for a pair in Test cricket. He also became the third cricketer to be dismissed by the opening delivery of his Test debut. The other two being South Africa’s Jimmy Cook and West Indian Leon Garrick. Malik, in his short cricketing career, has seen lots of ups and downs. On one hand, he was excited to be a part of the Afghan Test setup, and on the other hand, his nightmarish debut has crept in doubts that whether the youngster is ready to play at the highest level. (As of Mar 2021)
