South Africa vs Pakistan: Haris Sohail ruled out of the series

Pakistan didn’t make the greatest of starts to their tour of South Africa by any means. After winning the warm-up match against South Africa Invitation XI, they slumped to six-wicket defeat against the Proteas at SuperSport Park in Centurion. Even as they promised at various stages of the encounter, Faf du Plessis and Co eventually had the last laugh and took a 1-0 lead in the three-match series.

Sarfraz Ahmed and Co now have a lot of work to do in order to make a comeback and maybe draw level in the series with the next encounter, set to get underway tomorrow at the Newlands in Cape Town. However, the visitors have been dealt with a body blow as left-handed batsman Haris Sohail has been ruled out of the tour due to a persistent knee injury as per reports in Pak Passion.

Sohail didn’t play the first Test

Prior to the opening contest, Sohail couldn’t make the cut due to the same injury. Nevertheless, the team management roped another left-hander in Shan Masood, who did reasonably well, batting at number three. In the first innings, the 29-year-old Masood could only score 19 runs before being cleaned up by right-arm fast bowler Duanne Olivier, also the Player of the Match.

The Kuwait-born batsman notched 65 runs in the second innings and played until the fall of the ninth wicket. Unfortunately, apart from Imam-ul-Haq, who scored a gutsy 57, he didn’t get any semblance of support from the other batters. Albeit Masood did well, Sohail’s exclusion can turn out to be costly as he has been one of Pakistan’s gun batsmen in the most traditional version of cricket.

Back in November, the Sialkot-born player scored his second Test century against New Zealand in Abu Dhabi where he turned up with a patient 147. Prior to that, the southpaw notched his maiden Test ton against Australia in Dubai. He also has a couple of half-centuries to his names and racks up runs at a decent average of 40.33. His left-arm spinners can’t be undermined either.

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