Raza made his Test debut against Zimbabwe in Faisalabad last week, scored 27 in the first innings and was not required to bat in the second.
Chief executive Majid Khan revealed yesterday that the board decided to conduct forensic bone tests last June to establish the age of all those selected for the under-15 World Cup in England and for Pakistan's recent under-19 tour to the West Indies. ``All the boys produced birth certificates but we were very sceptical about them as they're often doctored in Pakistan,'' said Majid, conscious that birth dates of several recent Test players have been ridiculed outside Pakistan.
``We decided that the only way to authenticate age was to do medical tests. The board's policy is that we will now be going by them.'' These were carried out at Imran Khan's Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital in Lahore. Raza was found by radiologist Dr Zia Faruqi to be ``around 15''.
The board were happy that Raza did not contravene qualification rules for the under-15 World Cup, but 10 other boys originally selected for it were found to be over-age. The same applied to a further six for the under-19 tour. The former received one-year bans and the latter two years from all tournaments organised by the board (but not club cricket).
It was recently revealed that the captain of India's World Cup-winning under-15 side, Reetinder Sodhi, was exposed as a 17-year-old in a court case in India, upon his return home.
The radiology reports conducted by the Pakistanis also estimated that Shahid Afridi, who made the fastest one-day international hundred, off 37 balls against Sri Lanka in Kenya last month, was 19 not 16. Given the maturity of both Raza and Afridi, the board's revelations are not a great surprise. What is surprising is that the board did not make them public at the time of Raza's selection last Wednesday.
Majid was a little sheepish about the non-disclosure: ``It wasn't a deliberate delay - it was just that I had too much work on and the days went by.''
Matthew Engel, editor of Wisden, the guardian of all cricketing records, will now have to decide whether to include Raza as the youngest Test cricketer, given that the Pakistan board will not accept him as such.
Engel said yesterday: ``If the Pakistan Board are casting doubt then clearly Wisden wouldn't accept it. We're deep into footnote territory.''
He said, however, that there would be no sense of outrage at the apparent deception. ``Lying about your age has a long and honourable tradition.''