Lahore, Nov. 11 (ANI): Pakistan spinner Saeed Ajmal has dismissed claims made by a British journalist that the Indo-Pak 2011 World Cup semi-final may have been fixed, saying that this was being done to put a hurdle on the upcoming series.
"I think these allegations are being made now to just spoil our coming tour to India. There is no substance to the story. I played in the semi final and I know how every player fought tooth and nail in it," The Nation quoted Ajmal, as saying.
"But if there is any truth in that the match was fixed how come even after such a long time no one has been able to show any evidence. This issue is being raised again to derail our series in India," he said.
India and Pakistan are set to resume bilateral cricket ties after a gap of five years with a three-match ODI series and two Twenty20s in December-January.
A British newspaper had published extracts of a book by sports-betting journalist Ed Hawkins in which he claimed an Indian bookmaker had accurately predicted what would happen in Pakistan's innings against their arch-rivals.
Hawkins said the bookmaker, Parthiv, sent him a Twitter message during the Indian innings correctly calling that when Pakistan batted, they would reach 100 easily then lose two wickets quickly, reach 150 with five down and lose by more than 20 runs.
India won the match by 29 runs to book their place in the final where they beat Sri Lanka to claim their second World Cup.
Hawkins does not make any specific allegation of match-fixing but cites a statistician as saying the odds of the bookmaker predicting the outcome in such detail purely by chance would be 405 to one against.
The ICC had also earlier rejected the allegations that surfaced shortly after the match.
"The ICC has no reason or evidence to require an investigation into this match. It is indeed sad for spurious claims to be made which only serve to cause doubt on the semi-final of one of the most successful ICC Cricket World Cups ever," The then ICC CEO Haroon Lorgat had said. (ANI)
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