June 14, 2007	Thursday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 28, 1428

LONDON, June 13: Former Pakistan captain Asif Iqbal has called for a legal action against those elements that had maligned the Pakistan cricket team in the wake of coach Bob Woolmer’s death during the 2007 World Cup.

Commenting on the Jamaican police’s embarrassing reversal that Woolmer died of natural causes and was not strangled following Pakistan’s surprise World Cup loss this spring, Asif said that certain individual players and a section of media must be penalised for pointing wrong fingers at the Pakistan team, players.

Woolmer was found unconscious on March 18 in his hotel room in Kingston, Jamaica a day after Pakistan were eliminated from the World Cup in a humiliating loss to Ireland.

Asif, Pakistan’s former man of the crisis, agreed that although Jamaican police had totally mishandled the case from the outset but added that more damage was done to the (Pakistan) team by the irresponsible statements from some of Pakistan’s former Test cricketers and a section of print and electronic media in a bid to outdo each other besides increasing their circulation and rating.

A veteran of 58 Tests, Asif said Woolmer’s death was related by these elements to match fixing and Pakistan’s cricket culture which damaged the country’s image.

Asif, who led Pakistan at 1975 and 1979 World Cups, was of the view that a legal action should be initiated against these elements for defaming Pakistan and for insinuations against the national team and the players.

Asked whether Jamaican Police should apologise to the Pakistan team, Asif said the Jamaican Police had said at the very onset that Woolmer’s death was being treated as ‘suspicious’.

“The apology should be rendered by those persons and the media who had spread all sorts of malicious stories about Pakistan cricket and its culture,” Asif emphasised. —APP