Farhan Adil retires from competitive cricket

Former Pakistan batsman Farhan Adil, who played a solitary Test for his country, has retired from competitive cricket citing a lack of opportunities at the first-class level over the last four years. Adil said he was quitting "with no regrets" but remained miffed about his hurried inclusion into the final XI for what turned about to be his first and last international match.

"I must admit that it was quite strange [at being asked] to make my international debut in that Test without any batting practice for weeks," he told the Karachi-based Dawn. "This isn't the right way to tell any player that 'you are playing tomorrow', let alone someone playing at the top level for the first time."

Adil, 31, had been picked for the third and final Test of a three-match series against Bangladesh in Multan in September 2003. It was a gripping one-wicket win, in which Inzamam-ul-Haq played one of the innings of his life to save Pakistan from humiliation and break Bangladeshi hearts.

Pakistan had made five changes for this Test, three of them enforced, but the decision to rest Mohammad Yousuf and Danish Kaneria, and to include three debutants, raised a few eyebrows.

Adil revealed he had been told he was playing late the night before the Test. "I was part of the squad throughout the series. But for some reasons I never got a chance to bat during the practice sessions in Karachi, Peshawar and Multan [where the Tests were played]," he said. "Then all of a sudden the night before the Test in Multan, skipper [Rashid Latif] intimated to me that I was playing."

Adil was dismissed in both innings by Mohammad Rafique for 25 and 8 and was promptly discarded.

A right-handed middle-order batsman, Adil debuted at the first-class level in 1996-97. He played for Habib Bank and Karachi in 107 matches and tallied 5326 runs at 35.74 with a personal best of 211. In his last first-class match in 2005-06, Adil made 76 and 35 in a loss against PIA. His last limited-overs game was for Pakistan Customs against Faisalabad Wolves in March 2008, and he made 100 to help clinch a last-over thriller.