http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 Cricket: Spot-Fixing Drama Continues – Imran Farhat to sue bookie Mazhar Majeed?
It seems as if Pakistan cricket is getting sucked into the black hole of spot-fixing with the dawn of each day. Ever since the England tour, not a week has gone by without some news of corruption in cricket related to Pakistan.
Last week was no different, when an alleged video of Mazhar Majeed (a Pakistani bookie living in England) revealed the involvement of four more Pakistani players in spot-fixing. The names included Kamran Akmal, Umar Akmal, Imran
Farhat and Wahab Riaz.
Out of these players, left-handed opening batsman Imran Farhat is thinking of suing Majeed for taking his name to defame his corruption-free career. Farhat maintains that he has never had anything to do with spot-fixing and the
claims made by Majeed are totally baseless.
A source revealed that, “Instructions have been given to our lawyer in London to send a notice to http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mazhar-c75448 Majeed. We want Majeed to clarify and prove what he has said, or at least admit that what he has said was unintentional and
incorrect. Otherwise we will take legal action for defamation against him."
These claims come as a blow to the young Farhat, who has been underperforming for his team for quite some time now. The selectors have also been time and time again criticized for selecting the opener who hasn’t been able to give
an impressive performance during his tenure in the national squad. Farhat, who was already facing difficulties in keeping his place in the squad, is now marred with these fresh allegations.
Farhat has already been overlooked in the T20 and Test Squad for the upcoming series in http://www.senore.com/Cricket/New-Zealand-c754. This is not a good sign for him, considering the 2011 World Cup is just around the corner.
The lawyers of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Imran-c64193 Farhat are also looking into the possibility that Mazhar took Farhat’s name by mistake. Even so, this needs to be clarified, and only Majeed can give a clarification for this.
Majeed has been responsible for levelling accusations against Pakistan’s former Test captain Salman Butt, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif in spot-fixing, and now it seems that four more players are going to get their heads in the
guillotine because of these fresh claims by the infamous bookie.
It sounds like a sane idea for Imran to take some sort of legal action against Majeed, to get his name cleared and the record straightened.
The 28-year-old made his Test debut on http://www.senore.com/Cricket/March-c74391 8th, 2001. Since then, he has scored 2,327 runs in 39 matches. The opening batsman played his first One-Day International in February, 2001 and has managed to score 1114 runs
in his 37 outings.
He was also part of the team that toured England this summer, a tour that was marred with spot-fixing allegations, resulting in the suspension of Pakistan’s top players and creating an international embarrassment for the Pakistan
Cricket Board. Cricket in Pakistan has not been able to recover from this summer’s fiasco and now the claims of involvement of more players in spot-fixing is certain to create headaches for the cricket management in Pakistan.
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