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Conspiracy to defraud Pakistan cricket - Ijaz Butt

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  • Conspiracy to defraud Pakistan cricket - Ijaz Butt

    Conspiracy to defraud Pakistan cricket - Ijaz Butt



    In an extraordinary outburst, PCB chairman Ijaz Butt has pointed a finger at the English cricketers for their role in the batting collapse that cost England the ODI at Oval and said the board was investigating a conspiracy, involving "august cricket bodies", to defraud Pakistan and Pakistan cricket.

    In a prepared statement read out to ESPNcricinfo - and repeated on Pakistan TV channels - a day after the ICC started a formal investigation into Pakistan's win in the third ODI at The Oval, he also launched thinly-veiled attacks on the ICC, some cricket boards and the media.

    "This is not a conspiracy to defraud bookies but a conspiracy to defraud Pakistan and Pakistan cricket," Butt said. "We have taken it in hand to start our own investigations. We will shortly reveal the names of the people, the parties and the bodies involved in this sinister conspiracy and we also reserve the right to sue them for damages.

    "There is loud and clear talk in bookie circles that some English players have taken enormous amounts of money to lose the match [the third ODI]. No wonder there was such a collapse."

    When asked by this reporter whether the board had any proof of the allegations regarding English players, Butt responded with a question: "Did you ask the other people who made allegations against our players whether they had any proof? What did they say? We have thought about this properly and we have positive proofs here before us just like they say they have also."

    Butt then concluded his statement: "We feel the media in certain countries is biased and not fair. We feel august cricket bodies are also involved in this conspiracy, which will damage the great game of cricket."

    The statement is an extension of the one the board released late on Saturday indicating its unhappiness with the way the ICC handled the Oval allegations. Nobody in the Pakistan board was informed by the ICC that an official investigation was being launched; the chairman, the team manager and the captain only learned of it through media reports.

    An ICC spokesperson told ESPNcricinfo they tried to contact Butt all through Friday but his phone was unavailable. "On Saturday morning [after the ICC press release was sent out] we came to know that Mr Butt was in Dubai. Haroon Lorgat [the ICC chief executive] sought out and met Butt in Dubai on Saturday evening and discussed matters of mutual interest," he said.

    However, there is no indication that the ICC tried to contact anyone else in the PCB, nor tried to reach Butt - who was in New Delhi after meeting the ICC president Sharad Pawar - through any number other than his Pakistan mobile.

    The PCB also seems unhappy with the official implication that Pakistan's batsmen were under the scanner. Though the ICC didn't point the finger at Pakistan in their statement - though The Sun did so in their report - the subsequent statement from the ECB confirmed that no English players were involved.

    "One statement from a very august official of the ICC said no, only Pakistan players were involved," Butt said, though he refused to elaborate.

    Butt also refused to give more details of the nature of the board's investigation, though he said it had already begun. "I will be revealing names of people and organisations who are involved in this, so I don't want to comment more on the investigations just now. Details will come out only once our investigations are complete."

    Butt's comments may well signal the final nail in the coffin of the PCB's relationship with the ICC, if they have not completely broken down already. Under Butt's tenure, the two have clashed consistently. In 2009, the PCB threatened to take the ICC to court after Pakistan was removed as a venue from the 2011 World Cup, following the Lahore terror attacks on Sri Lanka in March. The dispute was resolved out of court but tensions have simmered consistently since.

    They boiled over again in the aftermath of allegations of spot-fixing during the fourth Test at Lord's. The ICC provisionally suspended the three players at the centre of the scandal, Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir, after the Pakistan board refused to do so. At a press conference in Lahore soon after he returned, the board chairman expressed his unhappiness with the ICC's decision while a police investigation was still ongoing against the three.

    Butt then went to Delhi to discuss the investigation and allegations with Sharad Pawar, the ICC president. He travelled on Saturday to Dubai, the ICC HQ, though it is unclear whether he has met with officials there. He said, however, that he would raise these issues at the next ICC meeting, on October 11.

    Pakistan in England 2010: Conspiracy to defraud Pakistan cricket - Ijaz Butt | Cricket News | England v Pakistan 2010 | Cricinfo.com
    Sad mentality, which sadly is not restricted just to pakistani fanboys on the web. In light of match-fixing allegations against their players, you'd think they'd clean up their act, but nope its all just a conspiracy by the evil english cricket board!
    Cow is the only animal that not only inhales oxygen, but also exhales it.
    -Rekha Arya, Former Minister of Animal Husbandry

  • #2
    The statement from the PCB chief that the English team had thrown the last match is indeed very strange. ECB has been working very hard to bring cricket back to Pakistan and this statement from the PCB Chief is highly unwarranted. This also puts a question mark on the victory of his Pakistani team. Izaj Butt's statements undermine his own players' efforts in winning the third ODI against England

    Ijaz Butt is not a tabloid. Even if he had been one, then hurling accusations at another team for having thrown a match probably wouldn't have passed for acceptable behaviour. He would have been chided for not going to the Anti-Corruption and Security Unit or police officials first and handing over some proof before revealing all; chided, that is, for not following a process.

    No, Butt is not a tabloid. He is the sitting board chairman of a full member of the ICC. To say what he has said publicly scrapes even the barrel of unacceptable social decorum. To do so to the team of a board whose chairman has gone out of his way to help you, as Giles Clarke has, over the last year is outside the bounds of sane behavior.

    Clarke heads the ICC's task force on bringing cricket back to Pakistan; he has pushed the idea of an international XI playing here. In September's Wisden Cricketer, Clarke writes knowledgeably and with some passion of the importance of international cricket returning to Pakistan. If a slap in the face was acceptable as a return for favours, then here is Butt's response.
    Forget Clarke: what is the chairman saying to his own team? "Sorry Gul and company, that super win of yours, against-all-odds, from an unwinnable position and all that? Sorry, that was only because the other team might have thrown it." And it should be worrying, very worrying, that the debate Butt is starting displays a total lack of understanding of the nuances of modern fixing. How can Pakistan be blamed for fixing when it loses and when it wins, asks Butt. If he doesn't know - or chooses to ignore - the irrelevance of spot-fixing to the ultimate result of a match, harder times lie in wait.
    Osman Samiuddin: Butt has shot himself in both feet | Opinion | Cricinfo Magazine | Cricinfo.com

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    • #3
      I feel deeply sorry for those Pakistani cricketers who just want to play & those fans who just want to watch them. Between terrorists, the board & some members of the team they are being done a terrible disservice. As a fan of cricket I mourn the implosion of a team & cricketing nation that has provided me such joy. Sitting in the crowd & watching Pakistan win the World Cup at the MCG is one of my great sporting memories.

      Don't get too smug Sumob. The increasing power of Indian money & the Indian board is a bigger threat to cricket than anything Pakistan can provide. This is just a sad little sideshow by comparison. I'm not sure the game I love will exist in any recognizable form in a generation.
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      Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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      • #4
        Reply to Bigfella

        I am not being smug about the problems being faced by Pakistani cricketers.
        It is a fact that we in India have to be more careful of the money flowin. Already the free flow flow of huge amounts of cash, endorsements are taking a toll on the younger lot. The young cricketers do not want to work hard, they would just prefer to get in the T20 format and the flashy cars and millions of Rupees is around the corner.

        Unfortunately our cricket board is too punch drunk with power to take necessary corrective actions. That is the big shame.

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