ICC should investigate Amir's first-ball wide in Lord's Test: Adviser

Published>Tue, Sep 14 10 12:28 PM

London, Sep 14(ANI): An International Cricket Council (ICC) anti-corruption unit adviser and a senior betting industry expert has urged the governing body to investigate the first-ball wide from Pakistan fast bowler Mohammed Amir in the tarnished Lord's Test against England.

Mark Davies said that the ICC inquiry into allegations of bowling 'no-balls' to order - against suspended Pakistan trio of Amir, Mohammad Asif and captain Salman Butt - should also focus on the opening delivery, a wide that cost five runs.

"The knowledge that five runs will be scored from the first ball could be used in several spot-betting and spread betting markets, the kind of books that the ICC ACU know are made in the illegal betting markets in India and other parts of Asia," The News quoted Davies, as saying.

"Most obviously it could be used to make money on the spread for the number of deliveries before the first wide is bowled, then any spread on the number of runs from the first ball, the number of runs in the first over and also to take a position on the number of runs scored during the first three or first 15 overs," he added.

Davies also refused to agree with the commentators that the slope at Lord's was an explanation behind the delivery.

"It is extraordinary that any top-class bowler would ever bowl a ball like that, full stop," he said.

Davies, one of the founders of Betfair -the world's largest internet betting exchange, has been an adviser to the anti-corruption unit on all aspects of cricket's links with the gaming industry. (ANI)

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