LONDON: Former Pakistan captain Salman Butt has said thousands of pounds of cash discovered by police searches of his hotel room during spot-fixing inquiries was all part of his legitimate tour allowances.
Butt and pacemen Mohammad Asif and Mohammed Aamer were all provisionally suspended by the International Cricket Council (ICC) following allegations resulting from a sting operation conducted by Britains News of the World newspaper that theyd all conspired in the bowling of deliberate no-balls as part of a betting scam during the fourth Test against England at Lords in August.
There were subsequent newspaper accusations that police had discovered 15,000 pounds in marked notes in Butts hotel room.
However Butt, in an excerpt of an interview at his Lahore home with an international sports TV channel, said: Well I think everybody knows the PCB (Pakistan Cricket Board) pays us daily allowances on tours and it was a long tour.
About 11,000 pounds of that money was from our daily allowances and being the captain I had an extra entertainment allowance which amounts to about 4,500 pounds from the tour, which I had with me.
Butts case, and that of Asif and Aamer, will be heard by a three-man panel chaired by English lawyer Michael Beloff, who heads the ICCs code of conduct commission, at a hearing in Doha, Qatar, next month.
Butt and pacemen Mohammad Asif and Mohammed Aamer were all provisionally suspended by the International Cricket Council (ICC) following allegations resulting from a sting operation conducted by Britains News of the World newspaper that theyd all conspired in the bowling of deliberate no-balls as part of a betting scam during the fourth Test against England at Lords in August.
There were subsequent newspaper accusations that police had discovered 15,000 pounds in marked notes in Butts hotel room.
However Butt, in an excerpt of an interview at his Lahore home with an international sports TV channel, said: Well I think everybody knows the PCB (Pakistan Cricket Board) pays us daily allowances on tours and it was a long tour.
About 11,000 pounds of that money was from our daily allowances and being the captain I had an extra entertainment allowance which amounts to about 4,500 pounds from the tour, which I had with me.
Butts case, and that of Asif and Aamer, will be heard by a three-man panel chaired by English lawyer Michael Beloff, who heads the ICCs code of conduct commission, at a hearing in Doha, Qatar, next month.
