The Quaid-E-Azam Trophy, 2015-16 season, saw Mohammad Abbas topping the bowling charts by picking up 61 wickets in 10 games. And in the next season, he picked up 71 wickets to force the limelight to be switched on to him. So, from almost a curse of oblivion, now he was back into the reckoning.

This forced the national selectors to have a look at him and he was picked for the tour to Windies in 2017. Abbas shone immediately and nipped out Kraigg Brathwaite off his second ball in Test cricket. In his third Test against Windies at Roseau, the medium-pacer picked up a fifer. He ended up with 15 wickets from three Tests in the Caribbean.

The skiddy customer was also a part of the 2-match Test series against Sri Lanka but did not have much of an impact in a series which Pakistan lost in the UAE, their adopted home.