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Eddie Chikamhi Senior Sports Reporter
USA Cricket have set the tone for the upcoming ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Global Qualifier B to be hosted in Zimbabwe next month after they became the first team in Group A to name their squad for the tournament to be held in Bulawayo.

The Americans, who are in the same group with hosts Zimbabwe, are among the eight teams that are set to vie for the two remaining spots for this year’s ICC T20 World Cup finals to be held in Australia.

USA Cricket yesterday announced a 14-member squad to go on a tour of Africa staring next week. They also announced dates for a preparation tour in the build-up, playing two T20s against Namibia and Jersey in Windhoek, before warm-up matches against the Netherlands ahead of their first Qualifier fixture on July 11.

Zimbabwe, USA, Singapore and Jersey form Group A while Group B is comprised of Hong Kong, Netherlands, Papua New Guinea and Uganda.

USA included in their squad teenage left-arm spinner Vatsal Vaghela and all-rounder Marty Kain while Jaskaran Malhotra is back in the fold after recovering from his hand injury that kept him out of the matches in Texas.

Chair of the Men’s National Selection Panel, Michael Voss confirmed the squad to USA Cricket website.

“The selection panel has gone with this T20 focused squad that will give USA the strongest possible chance of taking a historic first ever qualification for any senior World Cup.

“Vatsal Vaghela and Marty Kain both performed well in Florida during the drawn Ireland v USA series in our last T20 internationals in December and retain their places, while we are confident that Jaskaran Malhotra will have had sufficient time to recover from his unfortunate hand injury to give us his power hitting in the middle order,” he said.

The tournament is scheduled to run from July 11 to July 17 in Bulawayo. Papua New Guinea were the first to name their squad.

USA T20 World Cup Qualifier squad: Monank Patel (Captain), Aaron Jones, Ali Khan, Cameron Stevenson, Gajanand Singh, Jaskaran Malhotra, Marty Kain, Nisarg Patel, Rusty Theron, Saurabh Netravalkar, Steven Taylor, Sushant Modani, Yasir Mohammed, Vatsal Vaghela
Schedule (all T20s)
USA in Namibia (practice matches)

USA vs Namibia, Windhoek June 30th
USA vs Namibia, Windhoek July 1st
USA vs Jersey, Windhoek July 2nd
USA vs Jersey, Windhoek July 3rd
USA in Zimbabwe
USA vs Netherlands, Harare, July 6th – Warm-up match
USA vs Netherlands, Harare, July 7th – Warm-up match
T20 World Cup Qualifier B (Group A)
USA vs Jersey, Bulawayo, July 11th
USA vs Singapore, Bulawayo, July 12th
USA vs Zimbabwe, Bulawayo, July 14th
Semi-Finals/5-8th Place Play-off, Bulawayo, July 15th
Final Classification Match, Bulawayo, July 17th