Ahmed Shehzad set to get four-year ban for doping

Ahmed Shehzad is on the brink of facing a four-year ban after the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) confirmed that it Shehzad, who had failed a drug test conducted during a domestic tournament in April.

Ahmed Shehzad is on the brink of facing a four-year ban after the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) confirmed that it was opener, who had failed a drug test conducted during a domestic tournament in April.

The PCB is set to issue a formal charge sheet by Tuesday evening. The opener, who failed the drug test in Faisalabad in the last week of April, will be given 14 days’ time to respond to the charges.

At the time of the test, PCB had decided against disclosing the name of the cricketer.

The offence is the latest in a long litany of Pakistani players charged with doping and is a severe blow to the 26-year-old's stuttering career.

Shehzad lost his Test place following Pakistan's tour to the West Indies in mid-2017 and has not played a one day international since last October.

He was part of Pakistan's Twenty20 squad for the team's two international matches last month, managing scores of 14 and 24, but missed out on playing for the tri-series Twenty20 in Zimbabwe which ended Sunday.

Pakistan's cricketers have a history of failing tests for performance enhancing drugs.

Pace bowlers Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif were both caught using banned substances in 2006 but later reprieved after a tribunal set aside their drug tests.

Later rule changes led to a two-year ban for left-arm spinner Raza Hasan, who failed a doping test in 2015.

Two other Pakistan spinners, Yasir Shah and Abdur Rehman, have also received temporary bans in recent years.