Cricket Bloggers of Pakistan

The PCB is seeking to make a fresh appeal to Dubai authorities requesting them to revoke the traveling restrictionson fast bowler Mohammad Asif who was banned from entering the UAE after being stopped with a small quantity of opium at Dubai airport in June 2008.

He spent 19 days in detention in the UAE and was barred from re-entering Dubai, though no criminal charges were pressed as the government of Pakistan intervened and help wriggle him out of jail. Last year the PCB had tried to negotiate Asif’s reentry into Dubai for the series with New Zealand but ran into a dead end, this year they will apparently try again.

Saldy my opinion back then was to leave this disgraceful cricket rotting in jail. He had gone to represent Pakistan and disgraced the nation in a foreign land, there should be no room for cheat and morons who think they can go skipping around tarnishing the name of Pakistan. Ban him (and Afridi) for life, from ever representing Pakistan ever again

This article at Cricket Bloggers of Pakistan has been composed by Teeth Maestro.

In all the controversy concerning Mohammed Asif – this latest report is probably his last ditch effort to save his skin specially after IPL announced on Monday that Asif had tested positive for a banned substance, following which the Pakistan Cricket Board suspended him. It’s embarrassing as it is but I truly I wish him and his lawyer luck in hoping to find out a safe exit, can we safely say innocent until proven guilty or was the Sample A, enough of evidence to indict him out of cricket

Reported in Cricinfo: Pakistan fast bowler Mohammad Asif has asked for his B sample test, which had been scheduled for July 28, to be postponed. His lawyer, Shahid Karim, wants more time to prepare for the case and make travel arrangements.

“From the IPL we certainly want the documents that relate to the procedures they adopted for the ‘A’ sample test and we are entitled to have them,” Karim told PTI. “We also want certain documents from the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) that might be relevant to the case.”

It is being reports on various news outlets that Mohammed Asif, Pakistan’s fast bowler has been held up in Dubai on suspicion of being in possession of drugs [opium or hashish].

Cricinfo: Though another senior PCB official, confirming the news of Asif’s detention to Cricinfo earlier, had said that the substance was suspected to be either hashish or opium, Nadeem Akram, a senior board official who is in Dubai handling the case, said officials had not yet identified what the substance is. “It has been sent to a lab for testing but we do not know yet what it is,” Akram, in Dubai since Sunday, told Cricinfo. Akram also stressed that Asif hadn’t yet been arrested and that he had been detained. “No charges have been brought yet.

We wont need to jog our memory too far behind to October 2006 when our fast pacer duo Shoaib Akhtar and Mohd Asif were both involved in a Nandrolone drug scandal lucky for them then that they were able to sneak out of India before all hell broke loose, in Pakistan they were reprimanded with light sentences. Mohd Asif has already disgraced Pakistan once before and if that were not a lesson, they might be messing up with their lives but when it comes to tarnishing the National image then I believe we should have zero tolerance for such repeat offenders.