Cricketer Amir slams seniors

Pakistani cricketer Mohammad Amir Islamabad - Agencies Pakistani cricketer Mohammad Amir has claimed senior cricketers Salman Butt and Mazhar Majeed trapped him into becoming involved in the Pakistan spot-fixing scandal that earned him a six-month prison sentence and a worldwide ban from the game. Amir is back in Pakistan attempting to rebuild his life after serving half his jail term in a young offenders’ institute, where he said he was well treated by staff and fellow prisoners. Amir gave his version of events for the first time in an interview with Sky Sports, describing how he felt betrayed by Butt, a man he once viewed as an “elder brother”. He claimed Majeed summoned him to his grey sports car on the eve of the Lord’s Test and, with Butt in the back seat, explained how he was already being investigated for fixing by the International Cricket Council. At Southwark Crown Court last year it was revealed by the prosecution that Amir had sent suspicious texts to a businessman in Dubai, vaguely referred to on Monday as “Ali”, which implicated him in fixing outside of the undercover sting operated by The News of the World. Amir claimed Majeed and Butt used these texts to suck him into their plan to bowl no-balls during the fourth Test against England in 2010. “I was in the hotel, I think, and I received a call from Mazhar saying that I should go to the car park because he wanted to talk to me about something very important,” Amir said, through an Urdu translator. “So I went out and Mazhar had a grey coloured car in the parking area. I went and sat next to him in the front seat. “All of a sudden it was as if someone had launched an attack. Suddenly he said: ‘Oh bro, you’ve got yourself in big trouble, you’re trapped, and your career is at stake.’ I said: “Bro, what’s happened?” "He told me that my calls and texts with Ali had been recorded and had reached the ICC. He said that he had received a phone call from a friend of his saying that my name was involved. I said: “But I have not done anything for him.’ He said: “Nevertheless you’re trapped; your name’s being mentioned, and the case is now open.’ “I said: “What now?” And he said: “He’s my friend and you’re lucky that he’s the one who is in charge of this case.’ He said that he told him: “Bro, put an end to this case, shut this file. Whatever you need me to do, I’ll do it. Whatever needs to be done, I’ll do it. I’ll do anything. "But Amir’s name should not be mentioned.’ That’s when he said: “Can you do me a favour?” I asked him what favour. He replied: ‘Do two no-balls for me.’” At this point Amir admitted he had been “stupid” and should have walked away. “I panicked so much that I didn’t even think to ask him, ‘what are you doing?’. On one hand he had spoken about the whole ICC intelligence investigation, and on the other hand he was asking me to deliver no-balls. I was panicking so much it didn’t even occur to me how ridiculous it was. “He told me that Salman would help me and that he was with me. It was at this very moment that Salman turned up and sat behind us.” Amir said he was “churning” inside when he bowled the no-balls at Lord’s. “I was cursing myself,” he said. “I wondered what was happening. I knew that it was cheating cricket; that it was out of order, and that it shouldn’t happen. “It was a really horrible feeling. Then I thought on the other hand that they are being kind to me and helping me. I thought that they are saving me and if I don’t do it, it might become a problem for me. That’s what I was thinking at the time. Then I did it.” Butt and Majeed are still in prison, serving 30 and 32 months respectively having been convicted of two charges of corruption in November. Mohammad Asif, Amir’s fellow fast bowler, received a 12-month sentence. Owing to his guilty plea, Amir did not gave evidence in court and denied his role in the scandal at his ICC ­disciplinary hearing last year, when he was banned for five years. Amir’s guilty plea was confined to the Lord’s Test but, in his sentencing judgment, Justice Cooke accepted there was evidence of his involvement in fixing during the Oval Test. “It was not a one-off event,” he said. The court had heard Amir sent his bank account details to Ali, and Ali replied before the Oval Test, saying: “So in the first three bowl whatever you like and in the last two do eight runs?” Amir said the texts were sent out of curiosity. “Twice he [Ali] asked me if Salman had had a word with me and then he asked me for my bank account details,” he said. “Had anyone been going through what I was going through then, they would have reacted in the same way. It was then that I sat waiting for someone and was bored. That was why I had sent him these texts.” Amir admitted he was “panic stricken” and “ashamed” after bowling two no-balls. He said that he did not know Asif was also involved in the plot and spent his time in prison reflecting on his downfall. “Why did those people do what they did to me? They told me that I was in trouble for texting Ali and what was in those texts. "There had been no need for these guys to make this story up. If they thought I was prepared to do such a thing they’d simply have come up and asked me. That’s why I’m so angry with Salman. He took advantage of my friendship.” Amir said he felt overwhelming shame when led from the dock at Southwark in handcuffs. “I was telling myself that I would never play cricket again,” he said. “I was crying, and saying to myself that I wouldn’t play or touch a ball again, nor would I even think about cricket.”