Pakistan Test team rocked by betting scandal
Just when it looked as though things could not get any worse for the Pakistan cricket team, they did.
Sulman Butt, the Pakistan captain, will only be able to watch from the pavilion as his team face the near hopeless task of trying to save the fourth Test match against England at Lord’s, starting the fourth day’s play at 41-4 and needing another 331 runs to avoid an innings defeat.
However, the team also had to face lurid headlines which claimed that some of its members are implicated in a betting scam for which police have arrested a man on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud bookmakers.
The arrest came after investigations of alleged match-fixing activities during the current Test. The story has been run by the News of the World and says that some members of the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 team have been involved in acts of cheating. A source from the Metropolitan Police said: “Following information received from the News of the World we have today arrested a 35-year old man on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud bookmakers.”
In what bares all the hallmarks of a classic News of the World sting operation the newspaper makes the claim that two bowlers, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif, delivered three deliberate no-balls against England on Thursday and Friday – in line with the predictions of an alleged middle man in London who met undercover reporters posing as members of a gambling cartel.
The man that the paper claims to be the middle-man is called http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mazhar-c75448 Majeed and he accepted the sum of £150,000. It is alleged that the payment was in return for the Pakistan two pace bowlers delivered no-balls intentionally at preordained moments in the match. Such an action could be used to make a large profit by certain betting syndicates who deal in huge sums of money in the gambling activities.
There is no suggestion that any members of the England team are in any involved and the match is expected to continue, although how much stomach Pakistan will have for the fight after a woeful display the previous day and now with another gambling allegation hanging over them is harder to predict. Latest reports say that the police were present at the team’s London hotel last night as they continued their investigations. Geo Television in Pakistan reported that detectives had recovered large sums of money from players' hotel rooms and also seized mobile phones.
Pakistan's team manager, Yawar Saeed, was quoted as saying last night: "I can confirm that we are aware of the allegations and http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Scotland-c756 Yard police are with us now at the hotel and we are helping them with their enquiries. This is as much as I can say at the moment."
A joint statement issued by the International Cricket Council, the England and Wales Cricket Board and the Pakistan Cricket Board read: "No players nor team officials have been arrested in relation to this incident and the fourth npower Test match will continue as scheduled on Sunday.
"As this is now subject to a police investigation neither ICC, ECB, PCB nor the ground authority, the MCC, will make any further comment."
This is not the first time that a Pakistan side has been embroiled in such a story.
Pakistan sides have been dogged by match fixing allegations since the 1990s. Last year a committee of the Pakistan parliament questioned senior figures from the team after there had been allegations made that the team had deliberately manipulated play in order to lose a Champions Trophy match.
As recently as May this year the International Cricket Council's anti-corruption unit investigated a string of poor performances by the Pakistan squad after they were whitewashed in the Test and one-day series on their most recent tour of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Australia-c746. In that case the Pakistani Cricket Board also conducted its own investigation into the tour.
Their conclusions led to both Younus http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Khan-c71319 and tour captain Mohammad Yousuf being banned.
Yousuf was recalled to the Pakistan team earlier this month and is on duty at Lord's but has made little impact with scores 0 and 10 in his two innings.
http://www.senore.com/England-rampant-after-Pakistan-collapse-in-fourth-Test-a24167
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