Back for good

He’s now better prepared for international cricket, he says. ‘‘The last time, I didn’t know anything, I just went with the tide, so to speak.’’

Plucked out of the national under-19 trials, Akbar — born and raised in Peshawar — went straight into his first Test match and did as his captain Aamir Sohail said. He admits now that he didn’t know anything about subtleties such as swing. ‘‘Haroonbhai (current Pakistan team manager Haroon Rashid) first saw me at the under-19 trials and said, ‘You can bowl outswing’. But I told him I just don’t know anything. Also I used to stutter in my run-up, it was he (Haroon) who worked on it,’’ recalls Akbar.

But the Test debut itself was quite an experience: he was airlifted to cover for Mohammed Akram and Saqlain Mushtaq, who had been injured in a night club brawl in South Africa. ‘‘I did not know what was happening. Coming from a land of Pathans I was just taken up by the moment. There was this whole culture shock. That set me back in terms of my cricketing career.’’

Not any more. Akbar believes the time is right for his return to Test cricket, he is ‘‘much more mature’’ and ready for the battle. ‘‘If I had started now rather than then, maybe I would have had a better start to my Test career. I am now what they call a pakka hua fal (ripe fruit). I now firmly believe that any player should be picked after three years of domestic cricket, only then will he learn.’’

So where did he believe he went wrong in his first innings? ‘‘I got carried away by speed and tried to be over-aggressive. A fast bowler has to take wickets and not over do a lot of things,’’ says Akbar now obviously wiser by experience.

In his hibernation, Akbar used up his chance to play for the same team as his idol Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) Wasim Akram and soaking in whatever the master could say. ‘‘He would constantly say, ‘You are a good bowler’. I just re-learnt the basics from him. He made me understand that my strengths are seam and swing and I should work on it.’’

Now Akbar is not a typical Pakistani fast bowler trying to blast the batsman with pace. He is much more like an Indian seamer and he accepts that gracefully. ‘‘Today everything about cricket is pace and it is more like a trend. But my strengths are different and I am not in competition for pace or any such thing.’’

Akbar comes in off a good season: He has picked up 42 wickets in eight first-class matches with two 10-wicket hauls, both match-winning performances, in the Quaid-E-Azam Trophy for Peshawar and in the Patron’s Trophy for PIA.

He’s relished the prospect of bowling to ‘‘the best batting line-up in the world’’. ‘‘I first bowled to India in 1998 in Bangladesh. Just two overs but I realised my worth then. I was bowling to people like Tendulkar, Ganguly and Azharuddin and they ripped me apart.’’

Things have been different the second time around.