You are probably right Ehsan bhai about Akmal being better than Farhat and Butt. But here in this thread we are not talking about his batting. His keeping has been a problem since the summer of 2006.
Kamran Akmal is probably the biggest contributor in Pakistan’s defeats during the last 3 and half years. I am 110% confident that the damage inflicted by Kamran Akmal’s wicket keeping is far greater than combined damage inflicted by Butt and Farhat or any other player since the summer of 2006. Let me prove it to you.
Between summer of 2006 and the last test played at SCG (his performance slump began during summer '06), Pakistan played 25 test matches. Kamran Akmal featured in all those matches. You can very well imagine what damage his wicket keeping caused in all those 25 matches. Farhat and Butt featured in 14 games each from the total 25 games Pakistan played during that time. Farhat scored at an average of 36 runs/innings and Butt scored at an average of 27 runs/innings. Akmal batting average was 35 runs/innings.
I am not defending Farhat and Butt here. They are actually considered to be poor performers for Pakistan but I am not sure if the damage done by them was greater than Akmal?? You decide…
Lets talk about ODI’s. Between summer of 2006 and November 2009, Pakistan played 74 games. Akmal feautred in 66 games, Butt in 38 games and Farhat in 7 games. Akmal scored at an average of 24 runs/innings, Butt 45 runs/innings and Farhat 23 runs/innings.
As you can see that Akmal hasn’t broken major world records during the last 3 and half years. He does have talent to bat and probably his batting average can go up if he goes up the order more often.
No one can dispute the fact that his performance was horrible behind the stumps. And his match saving innings after every 10 innings cannot compensate for his horrible performance behind the stumps in every innings. And more importantly those batting performances should never be used to compensate for his wicket keeping disasters, just like a bowler’s batting performance cannot be used to compensate for his bowling nightmares.
As a fan I would be more than happy if PCB decides to try AKmal as a permanent batsman in the squad, may be as an opener and give him an extended run. But for the love fg god, someone please take away wicket keeping gloves from him.