Shoaib banned after hitting Asif

daydreamer · #1 (**permalink**) 10-11-2007, 07:56 PM

From BBC.com

Shoaib Akhtar has been banned for 13 games by the Pakistan Cricket Board over an incident in which he struck team-mate Mohammad Asif with a bat.

The seamer was sent home from the World Twenty20 in South Africa and has also been fined £28,000 after an inquiry.

Disciplinary committee chairman Shafqat Naghmi said he had been found guilty of five breaches of the code of conduct.

Naghmi added that the controversial 32-year-old paceman's behaviour would be monitored for the next two years.

He was ordered to attend a hearing last week to explain the row which saw him strike Asif with a bat on the thigh, although he insisted the blow was unintentional and that he had been provoked by another team-mate, Shahid Afridi.

Shoaib escaped a fine of £2,500 last month for leaving a training camp in Karachi without informing the team management.

The fine was suspended after the PCB accepted he had told captain Shoaib Malik that he intended to leave.

Last year Shoaib and Asif tested positive for a banned substance ahead of the Champions Trophy and were sent home from the tournament in India.

They were subsequently cleared but the "Rawalpindi Express" has played just one Test and four one-dayers in the last 15 months because of fitness and disciplinary problems.