Undercover police officer infiltrated cricket spot-fixing network involving Sheffield man, court hears

The case was heard at Manchester Crown Court.

placeholder image — The case was heard at Manchester Crown Court.

An undercover police officer infiltrated a cricket spot-fixing network involving a Sheffield man by posing as a member of a corrupt betting syndicate, a jury heard.

His work led to the uncovering of an attempted fix in the Bangladesh Premier League in 2016 and an actual fix in the Pakistan Super League in February 2017.

In both cases, an opening batsman in the Twenty20 tournaments had agreed to not score runs from the first two balls of an over in return for payment, Manchester Crown Court was told.

Pakistani cricketer Nasir Jamshaid, 33, who has represented his country more than 60 times, was said to be the target of bribery in the Bangladesh "two dot ball" plan.

He then allegedly turned perpetrator as a go-between who encouraged other players to spot-fix at a PSL fixture in Dubai.

Yousef Anwar, 36, from Slough and Mohammed Ijaz, 34, from Sheffield, pleaded guilty on Monday to conspiracy to commit bribery.

Jamshaid is the sole defendant on trial as he denies being part of the conspiracy involved with the Dubai game between Islamabad United and Peshawar Zalmi on February 9.

Prosecutor Andrew Thomas QC said: "Two no-scoring balls in a match may not seem a great deal. No doubt the players were willing to go along with it because the risk that it would make the difference between their team winning or losing was relatively slim.

"The fact the price for this fix was £30,000 shows just how significant it would be if tens and hundreds of thousands of pounds could be made through fraudulent bets."