Butt rubbishes 'baseless' match fixing charges labeled against captain, coach

October 09, 2009 03:48 pm | Updated 03:48 pm IST - Karachi

Ijaz Butt

Ijaz Butt

Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chief Ijaz Butt has rubbished match-fixing allegations levelled against captain Younis Khan and coach Intikhab Alam.

Butt said the match fixing charges levelled by National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Sports chairman Jamshed Dasti were ‘baseless’.

Dasti, however, had later backtracked from his statement saying he was ‘misunderstood’.

He said Dasti should not have criticized the players as the team performed brilliantly in the Champions Trophy reaching the semi final stage.

“The parliamentarian has a right to criticize the working of the Board but he should not have criticised the team which did very well in the Champions Trophy. There is no proof of fixing. All such charges are baseless,” The News quoted Butt, as saying.

“This is cricket, and we are ready to explain the team’s performance to parliament committee,” he added.

Earlier, the International Cricket Council (ICC) had also brushed aside the fixing allegations labelled against the Pakistani team.

ICC Chief Executive Haroon Lorgat rebutted reports regarding the involvement of umpires in the scandal, and gave a clean chit to umpire Simon Taufel who was officiating in the semi-final match between Pakistan and New Zealand.

“It is not worthy of spending any energy on. We are very comfortable with Taufel,” Lorgat said.

“We are quite pleased with the way the game was played. It was played in great spirits. We all know Taufel,” he added.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.