Akmal dropped for Asia Cup?

Karachi: Pakistan's wicket-keeper Kamran Akmal has been dropped for the forthcoming Asia Cup starting on June 24. Akmal has not been named in a list of 20 probables announced by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on Thursday. The final squad will be announced on June 22.

Akmal's place has gone to young wicket-keeper Sarfraz Ahmed and is the only change in the squad from the one that played in the Kitply Cup. The selectors have also named uncapped off-spinner Saeed Ajmal in the probable squad.

Also named in the 20-man probable squad are leg-spinner Mansoor Amjad, in-form opening batsman Yasir Hameed.

Akmal has been under the scanner for claiming a catch which was later proved to be not out off India's Virender Sehwag in a league match of the Kitply Cup. Chairman of the selection committee Salahuddin Ahmed and his fellow selectors Saleem Jaffer and Shafqat Rana have lost patience with Akmal's sketchy show in Dhaka. Ahmed told cricketnirvana.com, "We have decided to rest Kamran Akmal because he needs to sharpen his work behind the stumps."

They will also be mindful of PCB chief Dr Nasim Ashraf's e-mail to the Pakistan team management which was sent a day after Shoaib Malik's side had suffered a heavy defeat against India in the league match.

In that e-mail Ashraf had lashed out at the wicket-keeper's below-par performance and made particular reference to his 'unsporting behaviour'. "Wicket-keeping was pathetic, especially after Kamran [Akmal] dropped the catch and pretended that he had held on to it. This is unsporting behaviour. I do not want such behaviour from any Pakistan player. Please warn everyone! We ought to be looking at playing another 'keeper," Ashraf had warned in that e-mail.

Despite his indifferent form with the gloves in recent times, Kamran has managed to cling on to his spot mainly because Malik and coach Geoff Lawson have resisted moves to get him replaced while at the same time increasing his workload by using the wicket-keeper/batsman as an opener in the one-day arena.

But with the emergence of Sarfraz, who led Pakistan to the under-19 World Cup title in Sri Lanka in early 2006, the selectors have lost patience with Kamran because they are unwilling to gamble with an out-of-form wicket-keeper for a major event like the Asia Cup.

Sarfraz, on the other hand, made a heartening international debut in Jaipur last November when he replaced Kamran for the last game of the ODI series that Pakistan lost 3-2. Since then the 21-year-old has appeared in two further one-dayers, when the selectors rested Kamran, during Zimbabwe's tour of Pakistan earlier this year.