Wasim Akram's fitness and injury status will be reviewed by a panel of PCB doctors on February 4. Akram had sustained an injury to his right hamstring on January 9 in the first Test against Bangladesh. He had only bowled 15 balls in that match when he felt a sharp pain in his right lower limb.

The PCB's panel of doctors, Tauseef Razzaq and Meesaq Rizvi, discussed Akram's case with the team doctor/physio Riaz Ahmed on January 28, and the collective opinion was that Akram still needed to go through a treatment and rehabilitation regimen. "Though there were some very encouraging signs of improvement, it was discernible that it was not safe for him to bowl at 100 percent. Since the chances of recurrence are quite high before full recovery was achieved, hence he was advised not to bowl again till cleared", reported the panel.

"There was no swelling or haematoma formation. He could flex and extend his knee without pain but there was obvious muscle wasting in the right thigh. On resisted flexion there was pain and also weakness in forced extension of the knee. There was local tenderness at the musculo-tendenous junction of the right hamstrings", reported the doctors after assessing his injury on January 28.

There was unanimity of opinion among all the three doctors that it was a case of first degree hamstring strain, and Akram was advised treatment and only gradual increase in training and stretching exercises.

Recovery from a hamstring strain takes about four to six weeks. Meanwhile, his rehabilitation programme is being supervised by Dr. Tauseef Razzaq and his fitness and injury status will be assessed by Dr. Meesaq Rizvi on February 4.


Khalid Butt
Media Manager
February 2, 2002

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