Ex-Pakistan cricketers Wasim Akram & Aaqib Javed trade jibes over match-fixing allegations

Pakistan great Aaqib Javed has come up with a stern response to his former teammate Wasim Akram's remark, which he had made during a discussion on a Pakistan television show in 2021. Javed had accused Akram of deliberately keeping him out of the Pakistan squad when the latter was the national team's captain after he refused to fix matches. Akram, while discussing Javed's comment, had said that he would have never let him play had he known about this earlier.   

Wasim Akram vs Aaqib Javed 

“Main ispe ye kahunga ki agar mujhe pata hota na pehle, main bilkul hi nahi khelne deta. 20 saal ho gaye retire hue, kuch bhi aake bole jaate hain, koi chup kara do inko. Sunta rehta hu main inki ye bongiyaan (I'll only say that if I knew this earlier, I would have never let him play. It has been 20 years since he's retired and yet they say such nonsense things. Someone please shut them up a little. I keep hearing such crass things from them),” Akram had said last year. 

Akram's comment was recently reshared on social media following which Javed came up with his own response. Javed told Pakistan journalist Hafiz Mohammad Imran that he left playing cricket on his own accord due to a positive reason and that no one had removed him. Javed's international career ended after his name emerged in a match-fixing scandal that rocked Pakistan cricket in the late 90s. 

“Dekhiye, khelna khilaana toh kismat ki baatein hain. Khel liya jitna khelna tha, lekin shukar hai ki khud chhodke, with big positive reason, main khud hi ghar gaya tha. Kisi ne nikaala nahi tha (See, getting a chance to play is not in your hands, it's luck. I've played my bit, but thankfully I left on my own accord due to a positive reason. No one removed me),” Javed told Pakistan journalist Hafiz Mohammad Imran.

Javed's career

Javed, who is currently the head coach of Pakistan Super League franchise Lahore Qalandars, played 22 Tests and 163 ODIs for his country from 1988 to 1998. The 50-year-old picked 54 wickets in the longest format and 182 wickets in the 50-over version at averages of 34.70 and 31.43. Javed earned a name in international cricket after some brilliant performances against arch-rivals India in the early 90s. He was a key member of the Pakistan team that won the 1992 World Cup in Australia. 

Image: PTI