The ex-girlfriend of Pakistani cricketer Mohammad Asif has claimed the fast bowler confessed to her that last summer's Australia-Pakistan Test was fixed and told her during the series to "stop praying - we will not win a single match during the tour to Australia". Veena Malik, a comedian and former model, made the allegations on Pakistan's Express News network during a discussion of the match-fixing scandal, which has outraged the cricket-mad nation as it is experience the worst floods in a century. Malik said Asif confessed during a phone call he made to her while in Australia that the team planned to throw the three-Test series, but she said she was unaware what Asif's involvement was in the fix. "When Pakistan started losing in Australia, I jokingly said: 'For God's sake, win a match.' To this, he replied, 'We won't win anything until 2010'," she told the late night Frontline program. Malik also claimed that before the Pakistan team flew out to Australia last December, Asif made a sudden visit to Bangkok to meet bookmakers there. "One day, he got business-class tickets and went to Bangkok," she said. "He told me that he was offered $40,000. 'I advised him not to be part of such activities but he did not listen. Instead, he went ahead and demanded $200,000." She added: "Since he came back, he has been totally involved in this. Once he told me that the entire Pakistan team is involved. From head to toe, the Pakistan players and officials are involved." Malik said she had provided details of Asif's travels to the Pakistan Cricket Board as well as information relating to a R15 million ($356,000) loan she made to him, which she claimed was in part used to pay Asif's lawyers, who were working to reduce a two-year doping ban. Asif's failure to repay the loan caused a public row between them, although they announced a rapprochement at a press conference in May. The match-fixing allegations, revealed in a sting conducted by Britain's News of the World newspaper, has shocked Pakistan and prompted its Prime Minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, to order an immediate inquiry. Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari - who is patron of the Pakistan Cricket Board - ordered a detailed report and demanded PCB chairman Ijaz Butt keep him informed of developments in the Scotland Yard probe, a spokesman said.
No comments:
Post a Comment