Sarfaraz Ahmed: “Firstly, they need to decide whether they want to play or not. I think both of them are immensely talented players, there’s no doubt about their talent”
Image taken by: Bimal Mirwani
Former Pakistan captain Sarfaraz Ahmed hopes senior batsmen Ahmed Shehzad and Umar Akmal start playing domestic cricket regularly as they are “immensely talented players”.
Both players, who last played international cricket in October 2019, recently opted not to feature in the ongoing Champions One-Day Cup, which is a domestic 50-over competition taking place in Faisalabad.
Lately, Shehzad has been very vocal in his criticism of the Pakistan team, but has not shown any indication that he would be bringing his international career to an end.
As for Akmal, he has spoken about wanting to return to the national set-up.
In order to do this, Sarfaraz advised the duo to start playing in domestic tournaments and keep performing well as it is the only way they will land on the selectors’ radar again.
“They should definitely play cricket but if they really want to. Firstly, they need to decide whether they want to play or not. I think both of them are immensely talented players, there’s no doubt about their talent. They played outstanding cricket for Pakistan but I think it’s their own decision,” the 37-year-old, who is a player-mentor for the Dolphins in the Champions One-Day Cup, was quoted as saying by Cricket Pakistan.
The Pakistan team recently faced Bangladesh in a two-Test series and suffered a shock 2-0 loss.
Their next assignment will be a three-match Test series against England, which is scheduled to be played from October 7 to 28.
Pakistan Squad for Bangladesh Test Series: Shan Masood (captain), Saud Shakeel (vice-captain), Aamer Jamal, Abdullah Shafique, Abrar Ahmed, Babar Azam, Kamran Ghulam, Khurram Shahzad, Mir Hamza, Mohammad Ali, Muhammad Hurraira, Mohammad Rizwan (wicketkeeper), Naseem Shah, Saim Ayub, Salman Ali Agha, Sarfaraz Ahmed (wicketkeeper), Shaheen Shah Afridi
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