The national selection committee on Monday, as expected, axed experienced all-rounder Shahid Afridi and batsman Umar Akmal for the ICC Champions Trophy in England in June.
Chief selector Iqbal Qasim announced the 15-member squad in Lahore after lengthy deliberations although the selectors had finalised the squad last week and submitted it to the PCB chairman for approval.At the end of the day, it transpired that the selectors made two changes to their submitted squad replacing the injured middle order batsman Haris Sohail with Umar Amin and preferring to pick left arm pacer Wahab Riaz to Aizaz Cheema.
The rest of the squad remained the same and Qasim said that Afridi was dropped because of his recent poor bowling form.
The same set of players with the addition of a few more are expected to get the central contracts for 2013.
The PCB also announced that Australian Trent Woodhill would be the batting coach of the team for the Champions Trophy and would join them in England.
Pakistan first play a one-day series in Scotland and Ireland in May before going to England for the Champions Trophy.
This will be their first visit to England since the 2010 spot fixing scandal.
Pakistan squad:
- Misbah-ul-Haq (captain)
- Abdur Rehman
- Asad Ali
- Asad Shafiq
- Ehsan Adil
- Imran Farhat
- Junaid Khan
- Kamran Akmal (wk)
- Mohammad Hafeez
- Mohammad Irfan
- Nasir Jamshed
- Saeed Ajmal
- Shoaib Malik
- Umar Amin
- Wahab Riaz
