“They had given me only three years to play”: When doctors had claimed Shoaib Akhtar had mere three years of Cricket left in him before his international debut

Having kick-started his Test career in 1997 against West Indies at his home ground in Rawalpindi, Shoaib Akhtar had a pretty ordinary outing having been handed a lone opportunity in the three-match series.

Apart from scalping his maiden five-wicket haul in the format against South Africa a couple of months later in February 1998, he had failed to come up with impressive performances for his side despite being one of the fastest pacers around.

The turnaround moment had arrived the following year during Pakistan’s first match of the Asian Cup Championship at the jam-packed Eden Gardens in Kolkata against arch-rivals India.

He dismissed the likes of Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar off successive deliveries, to puncture the spirits of the deafening crowd, thereby stunning them into silence. Akhtar had once even credited Tendulkar that had it not been for his wicket-taking delivery to him that day, he would not have been a star bowler that he later emerged to be in his career.

Doctors had claimed Shoaib Akhtar had mere three years of Cricket left in him before his Pakistan debut

A career which ultimately saw Shoaib Akhtar being named alongside the likes of Waqar Younis and Wasim Akram, was also marred by quite a many controversies. There were even reports of him having differences with both Waqar and Wasim during his career.

Moreover, he was often heard complaining of not having an able guidance, or a father-like figure who would guide a pacer like him during his initial days with the Pakistan team.

During an interaction with Wisden India in the year 2015, upon being asked if he would have done anything differently had he been appointed as the team’s captain, Akhtar touched upon his days of physical struggle with which he had gone through before making his international debut and why he always insisted for a need to have proper guidance.

The ‘Rawalpindi Express’ had exclaimed how he was born unfit, with an abnormal body and flat feet, and the fact that the doctors had given him mere three years to enjoy his Cricket.

“I was born unfit. Flat feet, abnormal body, double-jointed, hyper-mobility,” he rolls his eyes. “So I was literally on crutches on 1996 because both my knees were gone and they had given me only three years to play. It was through sheer will, my mind and my hard work that I still played. I thought I was only going to play 25 Test matches,” remarked Akhtar.

He ultimately went on to play 46 Tests for Pakistan, scalping 178 wickets at a strike rate of 45.7, with the help of 12 five-wicket hauls and a couple of 10 wickets in a match.