LAHORE: Maverick fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar and all-rounder Mohammad Hafeez have a good chance of finding place in the national team for the forthcoming Asia Cup.
Well-informed sources told Dawn on Thursday that though the PCB has doubts over Shoaib Akhtar’s match fitness, it believes that he has the potential to bowl well in the shorter versions of the game — the Twenty20 and 50-over matches.
“Shoaib Akhtar is no more Test cricket material,” a PCB official said on the condition of anonymity. “But he could be utilised in patches. He deserved being given a chance after performing well in the Pentangular Cup in which he claimed 12 wickets to finish as the second-best bowler of the tournament.”
As the PCB is not going to hold any training camp to select the final 15-member team from the already announced 35 probables, Shoaib will have to be cleared by the medical board in order to be considered for selection.
As for Hafeez’s selection, the official said: “Though Hafeez failed miserably in the last World T20, he has good prospects of showing his mettle in the 50-over matches. Thus he will get a chance, despite criticism from some stakeholders.”
“If Hafeez misses this chance, he will be out of the team for ever because PCB Chairman Ijaz Butt has issued instructions to provide maximum chances to any player before discarding him,” the official disclosed.
Meanwhile, another source said that Hafeez was only there in the list of probables to provide competition to banned Shoaib Malik.
“As the PCB has announced that it would review the penalties of all the six players, who appealed against the punishments, Malik may stage a comeback in the team. The PCB has been facing tremendous pressure from certain quarters including some top government personnel to include Malik in the team and Hafeez’s availability for selection would be the best way to counter that pressure,” the source said.
Moreover, the PCB official said that it was most likely that the final 15-member team for the Asia Cup will be announced on June 2. “Head Coach Waqar Younis is scheduled to arrive here on June 1 and the announcement of the team will be made the next day,” the official said.
He further disclosed that the team’s newly-appointed skipper Shahid Afridi was getting no support from the PCB in his campaign to convince prolific batsman Mohammad Yousuf to come out of retirement in order to serve the team in England Tests.The PCB Chairman has not on a single occasion advised Yousuf to withdraw his retirement decision and readily agreed when he wanted to proceed to Canada for a coaching assignment.
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