Pakistan have suffered another setback in their T20 World Cup campaign after Fakhar Zaman was ruled out of the remainder of the tournament. The 32-year-old was nursing a knee injury, which he aggravated during the Netherlands match on Sunday. Mohammad Haris, one of the traveling reserves, has been drafted into the main squad.
The left-hand batter wasn’t part of the original 15-member squad due to this injury but was added later in place of leg-spinner Usman Qadir. Fakhar couldn’t play the first two games against India and Zimbabwe as he was still recovering. He made 20 off 16 against the Netherlands but aggravated his knee problems further.
“Obviously with any knee injury it takes time to have 100% recovery. Fakhar and the team understood the risks of coming into the tournament and we got him in. You saw how he performed with batting in the last match, unfortunately he had a bit of a twist which aggravated his injury,”
Pakistan team doctor Najeebullah Soomro said.
With Zaman out, Asif Ali could be in line for a return in the playing XI. Asif was dropped after their defeat versus India as Pakistan added an extra pace bowling option. Haider Ali and Khushdil Shah are the other two batting options in the side.
Pakistan had a few injury troubles in the lead up to the World Cup, most notably with Shaheen Afridi. The fast bowler has played all three games in Super 12s but has picked only one wicket and hasn’t looked fully fit. Afridi himself admitted before the Netherlands clash that he is working his way back. Soomro insisted Afridi had ticked all the boxes from the medical point of view.
“From a medical point of view we were confident he was completely fit. You can see how he’s improving every single game…from our point of view we are very confident with how he’s going. In my view, the medical team, the specialists in involved, have all worked really hard with him, day and night,”
he added.
