London: The names of three more Pakistani cricketers, including the Akmal brothers, have cropped up for their alleged involvement in spot-fixing during the ongoing criminal trials against former captain Salman Butt and Mohammad Asif at a local court here.
The Prosecutor claimed that players’ agent Mazhar Majeed, who has been charged with accepting corrupt payments and cheating at gambling, told an undercover reporter that he had six players under his control.
The names of Umar Akmal, his brother Kamran and pacer Wahab Riaz were mentioned in this connection on the second day of the trials involving Butt and Asif. Both Butt, 26, and fast bowler Asif, 28, have denied any involvment in spot fixing.
Majeed, and the teenage bowler Mohammad Amir – who has also been charged – are not in the dock, although the jury has been told there is “nothing sinister” in their absence, the British media reported.
The jury had heard on the first day how Majeed bragged to an undercover journalist that he had “two bowlers, two batsmen and two all-rounders” under his control, with the batsman Imran Farhat also being named. However, according to the prosecution Majeed did clarify that Farhat was “not completely in the circle”.
On the second day, the court also heard of a conversation between Majeed and an unnamed Indian caller who is said to have frequently appeared in telephone schedules relating to the case and whom the prosecution has described as “sinister”. The discussion took place with Pakistan in a dominant position in the earlier third Test against England at the Oval, the ‘Guardian’ reported.
“They talk about ‘what we spoke about last night, and what offer can be made?’,” the prosecutor Aftab Jafferjee told the court. (PTI)
