Meeting with High Commissioner postponed

Meeting with High Commissioner postponed to Thursday, kit supplier suspends relationship with Amir.

LONDON: The meeting between the three Pakistan players at the centre of spot-fixing allegations and the country's High Commissioner has been postponed until Thursday, officials said on Wednesday.

Test captain Salman Butt and bowlers Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir left their team mates in Taunton, where Pakistan were preparing for Thursday's one-day match against Somerset, to travel to London for the meeting that will now take place on Thursday, Pakistan team manager Yawar Saeed told journalists.

Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Ijaz Butt will also attend the meeting to discuss the newspaper allegations that players had been bribed to bowl deliberate no-balls in the fourth test against England which finished at Lord's on Sunday.

The three players should be free to rejoin the squad on Friday, two days before the tourists' first Twenty20 game against England. There is another Twenty20 scheduled, as well as five one-day internationals.

Sponsorship fallout

The fallout from the scandal looks set to hit the players in the pocket too as BoomBoom, the official kit supplier to the Pakistan cricket team, suspended its commercial relationship with teenage fast bowler Amir on Wednesday.

BoomBoom managing director Ali Ehsan said in a statement that the company was also reviewing its position as the official supplier to the PCB.

Ehsan said the decision to suspend the relationship with Amir did not imply any judgment on the allegations.

"We cannot allow our brand to be associated with any whiff of corruption or suspicion of foul play," he said.

"While the suspension of our commercial involvement with Mohammad Amir is not a step we take lightly, we nevertheless feel that it is the right thing to do while a judicial process unfolds and innocence or guilt is established."