The International Cricket Council has launched an investigation into Friday's England-Pakistan one-day international based on information which suggested a scoring pattern in Pakistan's innings was pre-arranged. The ICC said today the investigation was based on information passed on by The Sun newspaper in England. "A source informed The Sun newspaper that a certain scoring pattern would emerge during certain stages of the match and, broadly speaking, that information appeared to be correct," the ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat said in a statement.
The investigation comes after a previous fixing scandal on the tour, when a player agent allegedly received money for organising players to bowl no-balls at prearranged times so as to fix spot betting markets. The Sun newspaper claimed it had passed on the information to the ICC before Friday's third one-day international began at The Oval after it received details of calls between a Dubai-based match fixer and a Delhi bookie.
"Cricket chiefs then watched as Pakistan's score mirrored the target that bookies had been told in advance by a fixer," the newspaper said. The report said ICC officials began their investigations even before Pakistan's innings had ended, and that "it is not thought that the overall result was fixed, only scoring rates in parts of Pakistan's innings." The ICC said it will work with The Sun newspaper staff and sources to "ensure full truth surrounding this match is ascertained."
A Pakistan Cricket Board spokesman Nadeem Sarwar said "the ICC has already issued it's statement and we don't think it is appropriate for us to comment at this stage." *AP Click for match report and scorecard