Bangladesh even came close to securing a spot in the final. They kept both India and Pakistan within reach but failed to finish the job, leaving India and Pakistan to qualify. India then outclassed Pakistan in the final to lift the trophy.
In terms of strength, India are clearly the best side in Asia, with Pakistan finishing runners-up. But with the Bangladesh-Afghanistan series starting Thursday, the debate over Afghanistan’s self-proclaimed "second-best" tag has resurfaced. Captain Rashid Khan has now dismissed the chatter as pure media creation.
"This is what the media does," Rashid told reporters. "They bring something to the table that gets people talking and joking. The more you joke about someone, the more attention you get. But sometimes it goes too far and doesn’t look good anymore."
Afghanistan’s rapid rise in world cricket, however, is undeniable. They stunned the cricketing world by reaching the semifinals of the 2024 T20 World Cup, defeating heavyweights Australia and New Zealand along the way. Rashid admitted that those performances naturally fueled such conversations.
"We went to the semifinals in 2024, that’s why people gave us this ‘second-best’ tag," Rashid said. "We beat New Zealand, we beat Australia, big teams. Australia were the defending champions, and we beat them in the last World Cup. That’s why we got this tag."
For Rashid, the “second-best” label is simply a reward for past performances: "You only get a tag when you perform well. Nobody knows what will happen in the future, but we did perform in the past that’s why people gave it to us, the media gave it to us."
