Akram leaves for London today (23 Dec 1997)

23 December 1997

Akram leaves for London today

By Our Sports Reporter

KARACHI, Dec 22: Pakistan captain Wasim Akram leaves here for London Tuesday morning for a check-up for his chronic shoulder injury. Akram has an appointment with his specialist on Wednesday morning and will return by Dec 28.

"I talked to my specialist on telephone and told him about my injury. He said it was not a matter of concern but was of the view that it would be wiser if he takes a look at it," Akram said from his Lahore residence. Akram was scheduled to arrive here Monday evening but will now arrive in the wee hours of Tuesday because of flight delay.

"I don't know if he would advise me some rest which may force me to skip the Dhaka tournament (between Jan 10 and 18)," Akram added. The shoulder injury denied Akram of eight months of competitive cricket. He also underwent surgery of the bowling shoulder in England earlier this July. Commenting on Pakistan team's failure in the Sharjah tournament, Akram said the match against India had taken a toll of his players. "Next day, we played against England but the players were completely exhausted. "Then Inzamamul Haq was also injured. Had there been a rest day, we would have been a different team."

Akram said Pakistan lost both the openers in the first two overs and then again suffered loses of Saeed Anwar and Ijaz Ahmad on successive balls. "We lost our way from that because the English bowlers were a bit typical as they were not either bowling fast nor trying anything extra. They were accurate with odd ball even remaining low. It was difficult to tackle them."

Defending his decision to bat ahead of Azhar Mahmood, Akram said had he sent Mahmood earlier in the batting and he got out, the critics would have questioned why he (Azhar Mahmood) was promoted ahead of the two batsmen (Manzoor Akhtar and Akhtar Sarfaraz). "They (critics) would have pointed fingers anyway."

Akram stressed that he had confidence in himself but if he failed to deliver, it's part of the game. "I know I am not in good form but if I try to run away, the bad form will continue coming at me.

"As far as Azhar Mahmood is concerned, he is being groomed to take over. "I know the defeat has upset the followers of the game. But we tried our best and that's all the team can do. The bottom line is that England played better than us and won," he concluded.

Source:: Dawn (https://dawn.com/)