PCB adds Aamir Jamal and three uncapped players to Test squad

The Pakistan Cricket Board has added pace-bowling all-rounder Aamir Jamal and three uncapped players to the Test squad for the two-match home series against Sri Lanka, taking it to 16 players. Batter Mohammad Tayyab Arif and fast bowlers Ali Shabbir and Saqib Khan received their first call-ups. The board released Ali Usman and Abdullah Fazal from the original 14-member squad, Dawn reported.

The first Test starts at Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium on Monday. Lahore's Gaddafi Stadium hosts the second from November 17 to 21, both matches counting in the ICC World Test Championship 2025-27 cycle, the Daily Times reported. Pakistan sit at the bottom of the championship standings and Sri Lanka seventh.

Aamir Jamal returns after a domestic season in which he was named player of the final in the President's Trophy Grade-I, taking seven wickets for 32 runs and scoring 55 for Markhor IT Solutions in the title match. He has played nine Tests, three one-day internationals and six Twenty20 internationals for Pakistan.

Tayyab, 19, scored 727 runs in seven first-class matches at an average of 66.09 with three centuries, according to the Daily Times. Ali Shabbir has taken 22 wickets in eight first-class matches and Saqib Khan 47 in nine. All three pressed their claims in the PCB Patron's XI's three-day match against Sri Lanka at the Islamabad Club from November 4 to 6.

Mohammad Abbas, who will lead the pace attack, said he wants the one milestone missing from his Test record. "I thank Allah that I am in form and will try to continue it. I owe a big performance, a five-wicket haul, in Pakistan, so I will try to get my name on the board here as well," he said at the Islamabad Club on Saturday.

Abbas, who has more than 110 Test wickets, credited regular domestic cricket and English county stints for his consistency, and welcomed the chance for younger players to establish themselves internationally. He warned against underestimating Sri Lanka and named Razaullah as a young player worth watching. Razaullah took four wickets and made 81, including nine sixes, on his Test debut against England at Edgbaston this year.

Pakistan have won 23 of their 59 previous Tests against Sri Lanka, who have won 17, with 19 drawn. Pakistan won the last home series between the sides 1-0 in 2019-20. Kusal Mendis leads Sri Lanka's 15-member squad. Babar Azam captains Pakistan, with Saud Shakeel and Salman Ali Agha also in the 16.