Syed Afaq Hussain was born on 31st December 1939 in Lucknow (I). He was a useful lower-order right-hand batsman and a right-hand off-break bowler. He was also a product of Ruby Shield. After passing his Matriculation from Model High School and went on to Karachi University to obtain a Bachelor’s degree in Commerce. In 1957-58, he made his first-class debut, when he was selected for the Karachi Blues in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy and was in the eleven for the side’s first-round match against Quetta at the BVS Parsi School Ground in Karachi. The visitors from Quetta found the Karachi bowlers too much to cope with, and the only four used were medium-pacers Akbar Khan (2-7), Taufiq Lodhi (3-7), and spinners Nasim-ul-Ghani (4-10) and Raees Muhammad (1-6) who shot the Quetta batsmen out for a miserable 30 runs. Ikram Qureshi, the Blues skipper, didn’t even have to call Afaq for a complimentary bowl. Strong batting by the home side then took the Karachi total to 385 for nine, as the game went into its second day.
SYED AFAQ HUSSAIN
Born on 31st December 1939
Died on 25th February 2002
Pakistani Cricketer
Afaq came in last and chipped in with a modest 16 not out in the huge Karachi Blues tally of 419. And then, before stumps were drawn for the second day, Quetta again fell all out, this time for a mere 55, and gave Karachi a win by an inning and 334 runs. In the second innings, Ikram Qureshi used seven bowlers, and Afaq in his four overs took 2-9. He was, however, missing from the Blues line-up for the rest of the national championship fixtures. His team just failed to qualify for the semi-finals. In 1958-59, The West Indians were paying a return visit to Pakistan 1958-59, and the focus was on test matches and the other three sides’ games played against the tourists. The season’s Quaid-e-Azam Trophy has already been gone through, but only one Karachi team had been entered. Naturally, the selection was tough, and because the Karachi people decided to do without an off-spinner throughout the Championship, he did not come into the picture. He was not considered even for the Universities team, as they had the Test cricketer Haseeb Ahsan in their midst, whose reputation was flying high especially after he had made the previous winter’s tour of the West Indies, Canada and the USA. In 1959-60, he landed in the Universities team for the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy and made quite an impact with his off-spinners.
In a first-round fixture against the visitors from East Pakistan, he had a steady bowl in the first innings at National Stadium. While Punjab’s Javed Saeed (8-36) had his career-best bowling and slumped from 157 for five to 159 all out, Afaq sent down 13 accurate overs for just 15 runs though he failed to get a wicket. And as the visitors from the then-eastern wing of Pakistan faced a huge deficit of 311 runs in their second innings, Afaq has a nice time with the ball as his opponents came crashing down to 63-5. Before time ran out, and the game’s three days were over, his figures read: 5-3-5-4. All four of his victims were out clean bowled. The Universities surrendered themselves to Karachi in the next match, who went on to become national champions once again, but he played for the Karachi University in 1959-60. Pakistan Universities Championship, which during that winter and the previous one, had been accorded first-class status. Afaq bowled moderately for Karachi in the match against Sind University played at Lahore’s Iqbal Parks, but he was simply marvellous in the Championship final against Punjab University which took place on the matting wicket at the University Ground in Lahore. Karachi emerged easy victory by eight wickets, and Afaq finished with a ten-wicket haul. Following his 4-42 in the first innings, he grabbed 6-49 in the second Punjab innings of 131. However, he was still not considered for international representative as he missed playing in any game against the Indian Starlets side that visited Pakistan in the fading days of the season. In four matches that winter, his first “full” season, he captured 17 wickets at just over 11 runs each was a fine feat indeed.
In 1960-61, Quaid-e-Azam Trophy was not held, but a new tournament was introduced which was to decide the zonal cricket champions of Pakistan. The trophy was donated by the then Present of Pakistan, the late Field Marshal Muhammad Ayub Khan, and the tournament was known as the Ayub Trophy Championship. He appeared for Karachi University, who went into the Ayub Trophy semi-finals where the eventual winners, Railways-Quetta, a combined outfit, beat them to enter the finals. Afaq bowled, batted and fielded magnificently, and actually played a single-handed role in the student’s brilliant display. Karachi University snatched a narrow, and nail-biting, two-wicket in the match (5-49 & 4-58), and then his team met the combined Hyderabad-Khairpur side where he brought in another superlative performance. As his team won the match, he returned ten wickets in the match (7-34 & 3-17), and if that was not enough, showed his prowess with the bat to score a solid 56 which all but entirely confirmed his talent as a promising all-rounder. In the semi-final against the Railways-Quetta, at Karachi’s National Stadium, he found the opposition a bit hard to run through, and a marathon 49 over a bowl in the first innings got him only 2-106. But he sprung back with a vengeance as the opponents went in to bat a second time.
The tussle between bat and ball was really tough, and the Karachi students lost the game. Afaq emerged with a really hard-earned 8-108. Once again, he had taken ten wickets in a match and his second innings figures remained his best-ever effort in first-class cricket throughout his career. He played just three matches and his final wicket haul was a staggering 29 at 12.82 runs apiece and the young Karachi lad was suddenly in the headlines all over. In 1961-62, winter began with the arrival of the Associated Cement Company team from India, he did not make it into any of the three first-class fixtures arranged against the tourists, and was content playing a two-day side game for the Valika XI at Sukkur in which he did not bat, and had a somewhat expensive eight overs in which he returned 1- 53. Soon after Ted Dexter’s MCC team arrived in Pakistan, and began its tour with a three-day game at Rawalpindi. The next match was played at Lyallpur (now Faisalabad) against the West Pakistan Governer’s XI, and he was on the side. It was Afaq who brought about the downfall of the MCC batsmen who were all out for 252 runs just before the first day of the match ended. In 32 overs, the off-spinner from Karachi grabbed 6-89 and wore his perpetual grin even bigger.
The Lyallpur match was a fantastic one to be remembered. The Punjab Governor’s XI was bowled out for 119, and the MCC team lost all its players in the second innings for a mere 106. Medium pacer Antao D’Souza bowled magnificently to bag 7-33 and Afaq increased his match haul to nine, taking another 3-22. Left with 230 runs to win, the Governor’s XI lost by just 29 runs. But Afaq had made his day, as he was named in the team for the first Test match at Lahore scheduled to begin only a couple of days later. More surprisingly Haseeb Ahsan was also on the side. However, the selectors had decided to play two specialist off-spinners after all. He had a moderate start to his Test career. He came into the bat at number ten, one up on Haseeb Ahsan. The two had added 18 runs to take the Pakistan total to 387 for nine when a rising delivery from England pacer Alan Brown hit Haseeb on the hand, and he looked in obvious pain seemingly unable to go on. Pakistan skipper Imtiaz Ahmed decided to declare the innings closed at that juncture and Afaq returned unbeaten with 10 runs. England quickly lost both their opening batsmen. Geoff Pullar went for a duck, and a few runs later, Peter Richardson lofted one to mid-on from Muhammad Munaf, and Afaq made his first catch in Test cricket. KF Barrington and Vice-Captain MJK Smith then added 192 for the third wicket stand.
Afaq was brought on to bowl before Haseeb was given the ball, but both toiled hard without any return. However, his first Test wicket came his way at 275 for four, when the England skipper played onto his stumps and was declared hit wicket. In the second innings, he came to bat at a critical moment when Pakistan was struggling at 148 for nine in their second knock and was barely 155 ahead of England. Haseeb was once against his batting partner, and the two then put their heads down to take Pakistan on the road to safety. Afaq was the more enterprising of the two, and played like a seasoned batsman, while Haseeb did his best by just staying in his crease. The last wicket stand was worth 52 when at exactly 200, RW Barber had Haseeb caught by Smith for 14—his highest score in Test matches. Afaq was unbeaten with 33, which also remains his highest Test innings. Afaq made another catch in the Lahore Test match which dismissed MJK Smith off Haseeb but didn’t take another wicket. And his efforts with Haseeb as a batsman ended as an exercise in futility because England managed to win the Test match by five wickets. Soon after Lahore Test, the England team went on to India from where it was to return about three months later to play two more Tests in Pakistan.
Afaq went back to domestic first-class cricket as did all the others and he was in the Karachi Whites team for the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy. But when the Englishmen returned, he had lost favour with the national selectors. He did not play in any more Tests and was not even considered for the two games at Dacca and Karachi later in the season in which teams composed of international stars on a worldwide tour, met Pakistani sides. However, he finished with 24 wickets in the season, at an average of 29.95, while his 164 runs as a batsman were scored at 41 runs per innings. And though it seemed that he would not make a good Test off-spinner he still go himself in the Pakistani team named for the England tour of 1962. But like the fate of the tour, his performance on the trip was miserable too. When Haseeb Ahsan developed foot trouble at the very start of the tour and had to be sent back home, Afaq should naturally have become the senior off-break bowler of the side. But skipper Javed Burki preferred Javed Akhtar of Rawalpindi (who was rushed as a replacement for Haseeb) over Afaq, and the latter was drastically neglected on the entire tour.
He barely got a handful of matches, and could only bag 13 wickets which cost him over 43 runs each. And his best bowling of the trip came in the game against Somerset at Taunton where he took 3-150 in 31 overs. In 1962-63, having returned from England, another domestic season awaited Afaq in Pakistan, but he went on rather unnoticed during this season. But then he actually didn’t do much. He bowled moderately for the Karachi ‘A’ side in the winter’s Quaid-e-Azam Trophy but played brilliant innings as a batsman in the Trophy final. Karachi ‘A’ met their junior string ‘B’ in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy final and after having shot Karachi ‘B’ out for 154 the ‘A’ batsmen went on a run-riot. He came in at number eleven and in association with Test cricketer Wallis Mathias went about increasing the total in a display of hurricane batting. The two added 134 runs for the last wicket before Afaq fell for 87, the Karachi ‘A’ total being 493. For Afaq, it was his highest score in first-class cricket then, and his stand with Mathias became the first of over a hundred for the last wicket by a Pakistani pair in a decade till then. It stood as a Pakistan record for three years, till it was bettered by Shakoor Ahmed and Pervez Sajjad for Lahore Green in 1965-66.
A PIA- Eaglets team captained by Wazir Muhammad toured England in the summer of 1963, and he was a member of the party. Besides many other fixtures, the program comprised eight first-class matches, but he once again failed to cash in on the chance. He began well, taking 5-38 in the first innings of the Eaglets’ match against Worcestershire, but in the other four games, he got to play, where he took only two more wickets. In 1963-64, winter turned out to be a good one for him, and it catapulted him back into national recognition. He was neglected during the tour of Pakistan by a Commonwealth side in early the season, but he had a marvellous bowl season with his native Karachi. For the season’s Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, he was put in the second Karachi string, the Blues, who were being captained by former Test cricketer Waqar Hassan. The Karachi Blues owed their second-round victory over Railways to their two off-spinners Afaq Hussain and Ziaullah who took 17 of the twenty wickets to fall. While Ziaullah had figures of 4-67 & 4-19, he returned 4-68 and in the Railways’ second innings of merely 78, a glittering haul of 5-22. Lahore Whites had been brushed aside earlier, and Rawalpindi was taken care of in the semis, and once again both finalists were teams from Karachi.
His side, the blues, emerged champions registering a narrow 18 runs win over Karachi Whites, and he took ten wickets in the match, 4-78 in the first innings, and 6-104 in the second, figures which resulted in the Blues’ victory. In four games in the season, he captured 23 wickets for 375 runs at 16.30 runs apiece. Another Karachi off-spinner Masood-ul-Hassan was, however, preferred to him when a Pakistan team made a short tour of Ceylon in August 1964, but he has accompanied the PIA team on a visit to East Africa one month earlier. In the only first-class match of the tour, against an East African Coast Invitation XI at Mombasa, he took 5-18 & 3-16 and played a big role with Intikhab Alam (5-49 and 2-8) and Shafqat Rana (130) in the PIA’s innings victory. In 1964-65, he should have played in domestic tournaments for his employers, the PIA, but the Airlines had to wait till December to make their first appearance of the season. In the meantime, the Pakistani team boarded a plane to Australia under the leadership of Hanif Muhammad. A young Masood-ul-Hassan was also accompanying the team as his understudy. Afaq’s performance in the previous season, and with PIA in East Africa, had kept him in favour with the national selectors. He didn’t play in the opening game in Australia, against Queensland, but he regained his Test place when Hanif decided to play him in the only Test match in Melbourne. Back in Test cricket after a lapse of three years, he batted steadily as he had done at Lahore in 1961-62, and remained unbeaten in both innings with scores of 8 & 13, but his off-breaks fell flat on the bouncy Melbourne strip. While debutant fast bowler Arif Butt (6-89) revelled in the prevailing conditions, Afaq was hit for 45 runs in his nine eight-ball overs, without any return. Then surprisingly, he was not played in the remaining two first-class matches on the Australian leg of the tour. The team hopped over to New Zealand, but he was given only two of the five games before the first Test against New Zealand at Wellington. He pulled off a fine display against Otago at Dunedin taking 4-31 in the local side’s first innings, but he was not considered good enough for any more Tests. In all, he appeared in only five of the 14 first-class matches on the tour of the two countries “Down-Under”, and finished with just five wickets to his name.
As a batsman, however, he finished high up in the tour averages–sixth at 27.00. Before the New Zealand team arrived in Pakistan for a three-Test series during the same season, He got to play in one Quaid-e-Azam Trophy game for PIA, but his team lost in the first innings result to Rawalpindi Greens. He was nowhere in national recognition anymore. In 1965-66, he disappeared completely but returned to play for PIA in 1966-67, who lost their only Ayub Trophy match of the season to PWD. In this season, he was invited to play for PWD in a friendly fixture against the Khairpur Commissioner’s XI at Sukkur. Against a side which contained many national stars, he seemed in his element once again, as he captured eight wickets in the match. For the season’s Ayub Trophy, he went back to PIA, who again surrendered to PWD in their very first match, and just before the season ended, Afaq appeared for PIA in a festival match against Peshawar in the latter’s territory. He scored 31 & 22 and took 4-33 & 2-9. In 1968-69, he began the season with the game for PIA against PWD, once again a friendly match, and later assisted his employers in a short first-class tournament which included four teams from Karachi. The hosts, PIA won that Quadrangular Tournament, and he played only with moderate success. The PIA did not enter a team in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, and Karachi had many other players to choose from, so he just remained in the background. With the England tour of the same winter being destroyed completely due to political unrest in the country, cricket was in any case, not the topic of the time. In 1969-70, he began the season with a bang. In a first-round group match for PIA in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, he smashed a brilliant unbeaten 122 against Lahore Blues at the Gymkhana Ground in Lahore. With Masood-ul-Hassan (67 not out), he added 167 runs for the unbroken sixth wicket stand, as he raced to his maiden first-class century. And then he went on to topple the Lahore batsmen over with first-innings figures of 6-38. Afaq played in all Quaid Trophy matches for PIA, and his team became the national champions by defeating PWD by 195 runs in the final at Karachi. Soon after the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy final had ended, the New Zealanders arrived in Pakistan to play a Test series, and he had to wait till the Ayub Trophy to play again. He was in the PIA ‘A’ side which added the Ayub Trophy to its list of wins that season.
Once again, he played in all five matches for his side, and had a grand semi-final game against Rawalpindi Blues at Lahore in which he hit 53 not out, and took 10-128 runs (3-67 & 7-61) to enhance his reputation even in the twilight of his career. This season, he played 10 matches scoring 361 runs at 17.25. Figures-wise, it was his best home season. Apart from this he also had a successful tour of Ireland with the PIA during the summer of 1969. In 1970-71, while playing against East Pakistan Greens at Dacca for PIA ‘A’ in the newly-introduced BCCP Trophy, he was still good enough to take 10-81 (5-36 & 5- 45) in the match. In the final against Karachi Blues at National Stadium, he scored 66 runs and took 0-33 & 1-43 and PIA went on to win the BCCP Trophy, but he was not called upon to play after in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy. Perhaps the PIA people wanted to give their younger players more chances. In 1971-72, he played only one match against Rawalpindi at Gaddafi Stadium for PIA ‘A’, where he took 1-8 & 0-9 and scored 2 runs in the Quarter-final match.
Till 1973-74, Afaq survived in first-class cricket, but during each of his last two seasons, he was just able to play in one match, every time for the PIA. His bowling was hardly being made use of and he didn’t bowl at all in his last match in 1973-74. So, this off-spinner with a grin on his face gradually faded away from the first-class scene and he was only 34 when he quit. Overall in his first-class career, Afaq scored a total of 1448 runs at 24.54 runs apiece with one century and captured 214 wickets at 19.42 runs each. He also played in two Test matches and scored 66 runs, with a highest of 35 not out against England at Lahore in 1961-62. He took two catches, and captured only one wicket for 106 runs, with a best of 1-40 against England on his Test debut. He was employed by PIA since 1963 and was posted to Jeddah in the late seventies. Later he joined Saudi Airlines in 1977. He came back to Karachi after retiring from Saudia in November 1998 and serve Pakistan Cricket Board in various capacities.
He was one of the CBFS beneficiaries at Sharjah during the Coca-Cola Cup in April 1999. He also worked as a Member of the Committee that was conducting scrutiny of cricket clubs in Karachi. After a brief illness, he passed away on 25th February 2002 in Karachi. He left behind a widow, a son and two daughters to mourn his death. Later his burial took place at DHA Graveyard in Karachi.
