Ricky Ponting and Mike Hussey, the Australia cricketers, said they did not suspect anything untoward in the Test match against Pakistan in January, despite allegations that the match may have been fixed.
In the same report that exposed the "spot-fixing" scandal in the England-Pakistan Test series, Mazhar Majeed, the agent, also boasted of his involvement in the Sydney Test result, reportedly saying Australia's remarkable win netted one betting syndicate £830,000 (Dh4.74 million).
The wildly fluctuating nature of that match raised suspicions of match fixing, especially when four dropped catches by Kamran Akmal, the Pakistan wicketkeeper, allowed Australia to set the tourists 176 for victory, a total which they never looked like making after some ill-disciplined batting.
But Hussey, who made what proved a match-winning 134, said despite the multiple chances dropped by Kamran, he did not sense that any of the Pakistan players had ulterior motives.
"It all happens in a split second, the catches off me in particular were all up to the stumps," Hussey said. "With those sort of catches, they either go in or they don't, I don't think you can try and drop those. I didn't think that there was anything untoward going on. They were certainly going very hard to get the wickets out there, they were going hard at me and they were certainly going very hard at Peter Siddle as well."
Ponting, speaking on a Melbourne radio station, agreed that Australia felt they had won the match fairly. "Certainly not through the middle of that game was there any thought at all. I guess we would just like to think that we totally outplayed them for the last three or four days of that Test match," he said.
The Australia captain said he had been left stunned by the fall out of the News of the World story.
"I am absolutely shocked at some of the things that I saw on the TV the last couple of days," Ponting said. "I'm just blown away at some of these allegations."
With one of cricket's greatest comebacks now shrouded in controversy, Hussey said he felt the memories of that Test have been sullied. "If the allegations are proved correct then it will take the gloss off," he said.
"But at this stage they're just allegations from one newspaper and so I think we've just got to be careful not to start making our own conclusions about things that are just alleged at this stage.
"[But] if the allegations are proved correct, then yeah it's definitely disappointing and very sad for the game of cricket."
* Press Association
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Profile of VoucherSkout
Date of launch: November 2016
Founder: David Tobias
Based: Jumeirah Lake Towers
Sector: Technology
Size: 18 employees
Stage: Embarking on a Series A round to raise $5 million in the first quarter of 2019 with a 20 per cent stake
Investors: Seed round was self-funded with “millions of dollars”
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FA Cup quarter-final draw
The matches will be played across the weekend of 21 and 22 March
Sheffield United v Arsenal
Newcastle v Manchester City
Norwich v Derby/Manchester United
Leicester City v Chelsea
Know your Camel lingo
The bairaq is a competition for the best herd of 50 camels, named for the banner its winner takes home
Namoos - a word of congratulations reserved for falconry competitions, camel races and camel pageants. It best translates as 'the pride of victory' - and for competitors, it is priceless
Asayel camels - sleek, short-haired hound-like racers
Majahim - chocolate-brown camels that can grow to weigh two tonnes. They were only valued for milk until camel pageantry took off in the 1990s
Millions Street - the thoroughfare where camels are led and where white 4x4s throng throughout the festival
MATCH INFO
League Cup, last 16
Manchester City v Southampton, Tuesday, 11.45pm (UAE)
Kamindu Mendis bio
Full name: Pasqual Handi Kamindu Dilanka Mendis
Born: September 30, 1998
Age: 20 years and 26 days
Nationality: Sri Lankan
Major teams Sri Lanka's Under 19 team
Batting style: Left-hander
Bowling style: Right-arm off-spin and slow left-arm orthodox (that's right!)
EMERGENCY PHONE NUMBERS
Estijaba – 8001717 – number to call to request coronavirus testing
Ministry of Health and Prevention – 80011111
Dubai Health Authority – 800342 – The number to book a free video or voice consultation with a doctor or connect to a local health centre
Emirates airline – 600555555
Etihad Airways – 600555666
Ambulance – 998
Knowledge and Human Development Authority – 8005432 ext. 4 for Covid-19 queries
The Perfect Couple
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Liev Schreiber, Jack Reynor
Creator: Jenna Lamia
Rating: 3/5
Key findings
- Over a period of seven years, a team of scientists analysed dietary data from 50,000 North American adults.
- Eating one or two meals a day was associated with a relative decrease in BMI, compared with three meals. Snacks count as a meal. Likewise, participants who ate more than three meals a day experienced an increase in BMI: the more meals a day, the greater the increase.
- People who ate breakfast experienced a relative decrease in their BMI compared with “breakfast-skippers”.
- Those who turned the eating day on its head to make breakfast the biggest meal of the day, did even better.
- But scrapping dinner altogether gave the best results. The study found that the BMI of subjects who had a long overnight fast (of 18 hours or more) decreased when compared even with those who had a medium overnight fast, of between 12 and 17 hours.
UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
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Kanye%20West
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Squads
India: Kohli (c), Rahul, Shaw, Agarwal, Pujara, Rahane, Vihari, Pant (wk), Ashwin, Jadeja, Kuldeep, Shami, Umesh, Siraj, Thakur
West Indies: Holder (c), Ambris, Bishoo, Brathwaite, Chase, Dowrich (wk), Gabriel, Hamilton, Hetmyer, Hope, Lewis, Paul, Powell, Roach, Warrican, Joseph
MATCH INFO
FA Cup fifth round
Chelsea v Manchester United, Monday, 11.30pm (UAE), BeIN Sports
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BEETLEJUICE BEETLEJUICE
Starring: Winona Ryder, Michael Keaton, Jenny Ortega
Director: Tim Burton
Rating: 3/5
Men's football draw
Group A: UAE, Spain, South Africa, Jamaica
Group B: Bangladesh, Serbia, Korea
Group C: Bharat, Denmark, Kenya, USA
Group D: Oman, Austria, Rwanda
INDIA SQUADS
India squad for third Test against Sri Lanka
Virat Kohli (capt), Murali Vijay, Lokesh Rahul, Shikhar Dhawan, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Rohit Sharma, Wriddhiman Saha, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Shami, Umesh Yadav, Ishant Sharma, Vijay Shankar
India squad for ODI series against Sri Lanka
Rohit Sharma (capt), Shikhar Dhawan, Ajinkya Rahane, Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey, Kedar Jadhav, Dinesh Karthik, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Hardik Pandya, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal, Jasprit Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Siddarth Kaul
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