News

Youhana to miss Jamaica Test

Yousuf Youhana has intimated to the Pakistan Cricket Board that he will play no further part in their tour of the Caribbean

Cricinfo staff
01-Jun-2005


Youhana's class was badly missed in Barbados © Getty Images
Yousuf Youhana has intimated to the Pakistan Cricket Board that he will play no further part in their tour of the Caribbean. Youhana returned home ahead of the first Test in Barbados after his father was diagnosed with a kidney ailment, and despite the team management requesting that he return for the second Test which starts at Sabina Park in Jamaica on Friday, he told the board that he was in no state of mind to make the journey.
According to The News, Youhana was quoted as saying: "I'm busy getting my father the best possible treatment, and I don't think I'm in a state of mind where I fly out to Jamaica and go straight into an important Test match. I'm disappointed that I've had to miss these two Tests, but my father's condition is such at his age that I have to be with him."
Youhana made two sublime centuries on Pakistan's prevous tour of the Caribbean five years ago, and is Pakistan's most reliable performer after Inzamam-ul-Haq. With both men missing in Barbados (Inzamam was banned), they crashed to a 276-run defeat in a match marred by rumours of in-fighting within the team.
Meanwhile, Imran Khan and Wasim Akram have joined the chorus of criticism for the first-Test performance, blaming both poor selection policy and over-confidence for the debacle. "It was over-confidence reflected in dropping Shoaib Akhtar," said Imran, quoted by AFP. "The West Indies were rated as the third from bottom and against them we lacked a wicket-taking bowler. Pakistan committed one of the most bizarre mistakes of dropping Shoaib. Mohammad Sami got injured, so where were the bowlers to get the opposition out twice?"
It was a sentiment echoed by Akram, who suggested that the selectors had been blinded by success in the one-day arena against both India and West Indies. "In the one-dayers Pakistan had bowlers who bowled ten overs and took wickets but in Tests you need to get 20 wickets and there were no bowlers to bowl the opponents out twice," said Akram. "We've never been able to win a series in the Caribbean and thought that this was our golden chance. But from dropping your main players, to poor management, we have spurned that chance."
Pakistan's depleted pace attack will be under added scrutiny in Jamaica with the match referee having reported Shabbir Ahmed's action after the first Test. The clamour for Shoaib's return - he will hurl his first thunderbolts for Worcestershire later in the week - could just have become even louder by then.