LONDON – Pakistan endured the worst day in their turbulent cricket history yesterday when a corruption scandal erupting overnight was succeeded by their heaviest Test defeat.
British police arrested a man on Saturday after a British newspaper reported that pacemen Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif had bowled three deliberate no-balls by pre-arrangement on the opening day of the fourth Test against England last Thursday. The practice is known as spot fixing.
The police said the 35-year-old had been arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to defraud bookmakers.
The News Of The World newspaper said it paid £150 000 (BDS$460 000) to a middle man in return for details about the timing of three no-balls in the match.
The report said Amir and Asif delivered the blatant no-balls at the exact points in the match agreed with the alleged fixer.
Pakistan team manager Yawar Saeed said the bowlers and captain Salman Butt had been interviewed by Scotland Yard detectives about the allegations and police took away their mobile phones.
The newspaper published a photograph of the alleged middle man Mazhar Majeed counting wads of banknotes given to him by a reporter posing as a front man for a betting syndicate.
The match, the fourth and final Test between the two countries, resumed as normal at Lord’s yesterday with Pakistan collapsing to defeat with the rapid loss of six wickets to give England a 3-1 victory in the four-match series.
The Pakistan players did not bother to warm up yesterday and were duly defeated by an innings and 225 runs before lunch on the fourth day.
Only a sprinkling of spectators were present to watch the dying rites of a series and when Amir came out to bat he was booed.
Unusually, the post-match presentation ceremony did not take place on the outfield but was moved inside to the Long Room of the Lord’s pavilion.
During the ceremony, England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) chairman Giles Clarke refused to shake Amir’s hand when presenting him with the Pakistan Man-Of-The-Series award.
The International Cricket Council stressed that no players or team officials had been arrested over the fixing claims.
Despite the allegations, Pakistan manager Saeed denied that Pakistan cricket was “institutionally corrupt”.
“I would not like to say that,” he told SkySports. “Yes, one has heard and one has read [allegations], but I would not like to go that far.”
A defiant Butt insisted he would not resign the Test team captaincy over the claims.
“Anybody can stand out and say anything about you, that doesn’t make them true,” he said.
Pakistan’s federal sports minister Ijaz Jakhrani promised that any players found guilty would be severely punished.
If wrongdoing was proven, “all the players involved must forget to play for Pakistan in future”, he said.
The News Of The World claimed their reporters had posed as front men for an Asian gambling cartel, paying £10 000 to the alleged fixer as an upfront deposit.
They met again on Wednesday in a London hotel room to hand over the rest of the money as their “entry ticket” into what the newspaper claimed was a “huge betting syndicate”.
Earlier this year seven of the Pakistan team received bans or fines after a singularly unsuccessful tour of Australia where they failed to win a single match.
By coincidence, the largest major scandal to affect Pakistan was the fourth day of the fourth Test in the 2006 series.
Pakistan became the first international team to forfeit a Ttest when captain Inzamam-ul-Haq and his side refused to take the field after tea. Umpires Darrell Hair and Billy Doctrove had awarded five penalty runs to England because they believed Pakistan had tampered with the ball. (AFP/Reuters)