LAHORE: Umar Gul, the former Pakistan quick, has been named the new bowling coach of the Afghanistan national team. The initial contract is till the end of the year. He will start with Afghanistan’s upcoming limited-overs tour of Zimbabwe in June. Gul, who replaced Abdur Razzaq as the bowling coach of Quetta Gladiators in the PSL last year to kickstart his post-playing career, was employed by the Afghanistan Cricket Board as its bowling consultant during a training and preparation camp in the UAE in April. At the camp, former Pakistan captain Younis Khan was roped in as batting consultant. Gul “worked with the fast bowlers in our national line-up and considering his effectiveness in the camp as well as based on the need, it was decided to offer him a permanent contract as the national team’s bowling coach,” the board said in a statement. Gul, now 39, retired from all forms of cricket in October 2020 after turning out 47 Tests (163 wickets at 34.06), 130 ODIs (179 wickets at 29.34) and 60 T20Is (85 wickets at 16.97) for Pakistan between 2003 and 2016. The Afghanistan team left for Zimbabwe on Wednesday afternoon for a series of three ODIs, part of the World Cup Super League, and three T20Is, all of which will be played between June 4 and 14 in Harare.