Pakistan wicketkeeper-batsman Umar Akmal, who was banned from all representative cricket by the PCB in April, will now serve a reduced suspension of one-and-a-half years instead of the original term of three years.

Independent adjudicator, Faqir Mohammad Khokhar, a retired Supreme Court judge, conducted a disciplinary hearing on the player in Lahore on Wednesday, halving the length of his suspension. The appeal was initially supposed to be heard in June, but was delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The suspension period will now be considered from February 2020 to August 2021.

Akmal was handed a three-year ban in April after the PCB formally charged the player for two breaches of the anti-corruption code, having failed to disclose corrupt approaches during the Pakistan Super League.

While he did not contest the case, Akmal filed an official appeal against the ban in May, challenging the length of the suspension, maintaining that a three-year period was unprecedented.

The 30-year-old Akmal, who has been guilty of disciplinary indiscretions in the past, has played 16 Tests, 121 ODIs and 84 T20Is, last featuring for Pakistan in a T20I series against Sri Lanka in 2019.