Shoaib, Asif need time, says Woolmer

LAHORE:Bob Woolmer, the Pakistan coach, has said Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif are unlikely to make a rapid return to the team despite having their drug bans overturned this week. Both pace bowlers trained with the Pakistan squad ahead of the third one-day international against West Indies in Lahore, but Woolmer is playing down thoughts of them lining up in any of the last three matches.
“Of course their return is good for the team and I hope everything goes well for them. I don’t see them playing in this West Indies series because they need match practice, but you never know.
“Akhtar told me he needs a month and Asif too needs time so they must play some domestic matches. Their return will certainly boost our bowling.” Akthar and Asif, banned for two years and one year respectively in November after testing positive for the steroid nandrolone, won their appeals against the punishments on Tuesday. The decision prompted criticism from ICC, but Woolmer said he was satisfied. “I read a lot of reaction on the judgment, most of which was uninformed.
Both the commissions did the right thing and if you read the appeal committee’s judgment, you would be satisfied like I am.” West Indies showed their fighting spirit as they made an impressive attempt to defend 151 in the second one-day international against Pakistan on Thursday and Brian Lara is confident, that with a similar effort, they can level the series at Lahore. Jerome Taylor, one of the stars of the tour for West Indies, and Corey Collymore took three wickets each but a composed 42 from Inzamam-ul-Haq guided Pakistan home. “Even though we have lost one game we will try and come [down] tough on Pakistan,” said Lara, who also played down the significance of a minor injury he picked up during a net session on Saturday. “I am fine, just getting some treatment. It’s been a long tour and we have been away for quite some time. Hopefully, everybody will be available for tomorrow’s match, including myself.” West Indies are expecting to be strengthened by the return of Shivnarine Chanderpaul into the middle order and it has been their batting, also missing Ramnaresh Sarwan and Dwayne Bravo, which has often let the team down on this tour.
“The fact that we played well in the second half of the game in Faisalabad is nothing that is surprising to us, we just didn’t get the runs,” said Lara. “I think our bowlers are capable of keeping the best batting teams in the world to limits. The games we have lost [in] the last three months were because of the batting so we need to get that together.”
Pakistan, too, will be without a key player after Younis Khan left the squad after the death of his brother earlier in the week. But Mohammad Yousuf returns after missing the second ODI to be with his wife, who is expecting a baby next month.
Bob Woolmer said his team is taking nothing for granted: “They [West Indies] are already a respected opponent and it was good to win a narrow match at Faisalabad. Narrow matches affect your heartbeat but we still came [out] on top and aim [for] that same performance. It turned out to be a difficult pitch at Faisalabad and there will again be some movement in Lahore.” Pakistan (from) Inzamam-ul-Haq (capt), Imran Farhat, Mohammad Hafeez, Mohammad Yousuf, Shoaib Malik, Abdul Razzaq, Kamran Akmal (wk), Rao Iftikhar, Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, Umar Gul, Abdul Rehman, Danish Kaneria, Mohammad Sami, Yasir Hameed—Agencies