KARACHI: Shoaib Akhtar must have felt like deja vu on Friday when he failed to make it in a 17-member squad for next month’s South African safari, writes Khalid Hussain.
The fast bowler was left out of the squad on grounds that he is not fully match fit even though most experts believe he just needed a little more time to get back in rhythm and could have been an asset for Pakistan on fast and bouncy tracks in South Africa.
But it is a sort of situation which Shoaib is quite used to by now.
During the best part of this summer, Shoaib made continuous efforts to play for Pakistan in the second half of the four-match Test series against England but was not fielded in a single match by the team management which believed he needed more match fitness. Pakistan lost that series 3-0.
Shoaib, 31, was later drafted in Pakistan’s one-day squad and he turned out to be their best bowler in a 2-2 draw in the five-match One-day International (ODI) series against England in September.
During the summer, Shoaib spent his time on the sidelines in the aftermath of a double injury blow - a knee problem that was followed by an ankle injury.
This time, the national selectors and the team management finally concluded that more than three months of absence from international cricket has left him rusty.
Shoaib missed the International Cricket Council (ICC) Champions Trophy in India in October and the home Test and one-day series against the West Indies in Nov-Dec because of a drug-related ban. He, along with medium pacer Mohammad Asif, was however exonerated by a Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) appeals committee earlier this month.
Sources close to Shoaib say that the ‘Rawalpindi Express’ was guaranteed of a return to the national team by a section of the Pakistan team think tank. He was told to play a few matches and attend a brief pre-tour conditioning camp that got underway in Lahore from December 26 before returning to the Pakistan squad.
He did play in a Patron’s Trophy match for KRL and later featured in a lost cause for Islamabad Leopards in the recently-concluded Twenty20 Cup. Shoaib was unable to come out with a sensational performance but, at times, he did look sharp.
The maverick speedster showed further improvement during the conditioning camp but was still unable to convince the selectors and more importantly his captain Inzamam-ul-Haq that he deserved a recall.
Sources say that though the selection committee was divided over Shoaib’s case, it was a negative vote from Inzamam that decided the pacer’s fate.
Forget the pictures that were taken during the Lahore camp showing Shoaib and Inzamam talking like close friends, there is no love lost between the two star cricketers.
Inzamam is the sort of person who cannot allow anyone to challenge his authority. Shoaib, on the other hand, loves to do exactly the same. In addition, top PCB officials have also been unhappy with Shoaib’s attitude.
Sources said that the Board people wanted Shoaib to show more gratitude for the help he got from the authorities in his legal battle against a two-year doping ban.
But just weeks after getting an all-clear from an appeals committee, Shoaib defied the authorities by refusing to wear a sponsor’s logo during the Twenty20 Cup.
Whether you could afford to ignore a bowler of Shoaib’s pace on such grounds, however, is a different question.
Without him Pakistan had a disastrous tour of England and the same story could get repeated in South Africa.
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