Daily Times

LAHORE: Kamran Akmal, the most-capped player in the history of the Pakistan Super League (PSL) as well as the tournament’s second-highest run-scorer, has refused to take part in the next edition of the league after being picked in the draft in the lowest category of players by his old team Peshawar Zalmi. Calling it a “humiliation”, Akmal said, “If it has to end like this, so be it, but I am not going to play”. The PCB had tweaked the player categories before the draft, and Akmal had been moved down from the Diamond category to the Gold category but was eventually picked up by Zalmi as their last pick, from the Silver category. Zalmi head coach Mohammad Akram is expected to meet Akmal today, but as far as the player is concerned, his decision won’t change. “If it has to end like this, so be it, but I am not going to play with such humiliation,” he said. “This is an embarrassment. You don’t treat a player like this. With all the runs I have scored in the league, I deserve better. I agree that rejigging the categories wasn’t the franchises’ prerogative, it was Ramiz Raja (PCB chairman) who reworked the categories. But being picked in Silver was a further demotion.” The six franchises met in Lahore last evening to pick their squads for the seventh edition of the PSL, which will kick off on January 27 in Karachi. Each franchise had a chance to retain up to eight players, and Zalmi chose not to retain Akmal, the plan being to pick him from the draft instead. Wahab Riaz, the captain of the team, was retained, while Shoaib Malik was acquired from the Diamond category. The team has also brought in Mohammad Harris as an additional wicketkeeper. Akmal’s PSL record is impressive. He has 1820 runs from 69 games, the run tally second only to Babar Azam’s 2070 from 58 games. Akmal has scored his runs at a strike rate of 136.84 and is the only one to have scored three hundreds; Sharjeel Khan has two. A Zalmi player from the start of the competition in 2016, Akmal is also the leading wicketkeeper in the PSL with 60 dismissals to his name.