Daily Times

LAHORE: Pakistan cricket selectors on Monday named express pacer Mohammad Hasnain as replacement of injured quick Shaheen Shah Afridi in Pakistan’s squad for the Asia Cup, which is starting in the United Arab Emirates from August 27. Pakistan suffered a major blow at the weekend when Shaheen was ruled out of the Twenty20 tournament and the following T20 international home series against England with a knee injury. The 22-year-old Hasnain will join the squad from Britain, where he has been playing in The Hundred tournament. Hasnain has represented Pakistan in 18 T20Is in which he has taken 17 wickets. He has also earned acclaim overseas with stints in the Big Bash League, the Caribbean Premier League, English county cricket and the Hundred. He already has a hat-trick in T20Is. He was banned from bowling internationally in January after his action was reported during a stint in Australia’s domestic Big Bash League, but was cleared to return in June after remodelling his action. Hasnain was again embroiled in controversy last week when Australian all-rounder Marcus Stoinis appeared to question the legality of his action during a match in The Hundred.

The Pakistan squad reached the UAE on Monday evening after winning the three-match one-day international series against the Netherlands. Pakistan will take on arch-rivals India in their opening Asia Cup match in Dubai on Sunday. Pakistan had been hopeful of Shaheen being able to recover from his knee injury — he sustained it in July and had since been kept under wraps by the team management. He still stayed with the squad and even went on tours — he was part of the ODI squad in the victory over Netherlands — but did not play any of the three games. Eventually it became clear that Shaheen needed four-six weeks rest and as a result he was ruled out of both the Asia Cup and the seven-match T20I series against England next month. He faces a race against time to be fit for the T20 World Cup in October as well.

Pakistan’s revised squad:

Babar Azam (captain), Shadab Khan, Asif Ali, Fakhar Zaman, Haider Ali, Haris Rauf, Iftikhar Ahmed, Khushdil Shah, Mohammad Hasnain, Mohammad Nawaz, Mohammad Rizwan, Mohammad Wasim Junior, Naseem Shah, Shahnawaz Dahani and Usman Qadir.