A jury has been selected for the London trial of former Pakistan captain Salman Butt and fast bowler Mohammad Asif on charges relating to spot fixing. The pair deny conspiracy to cheat and conspiracy to accept corrupt payments during Pakistan's 2010 tour of England. The case centers on allegations made in a newspaper investigation that they received money for deliberately bowling no-balls. A jury of seven men and five women was selected Tuesday at Southwark Crown Court, where the trial is due to start Wednesday. Butt sat in the dock alongside Asif behind a glass screen. Pakistan fast bowler Mohammad Amir and players' agent Mazhar Majeed have also been charged but are not required to appear in court. At the time of the alleged offences, Butt was captain of Pakistan's Test side and had won plaudits for his leadership of the team. Asif was the team's senior pace bowler, while teenage left-arm swing bowler Aamer was regarded as one of the hottest properties in world cricket. The allegations stem from a probe by Mazher Mahmood, former undercover reporter for the News of the World, known in Britain as the “fake sheikh” for wearing Arab dress during investigations. Prior knowledge of when no-balls will occur could be exploited in what is known as ‘spot-betting' whereby gamblers bet on various possible incidents in a match rather than the final outcome. Cricket is potentially extremely vulnerable to ‘spot-fixing'. Betting can be planned around specific incidents without the need to manipulate the final result of the match. The most infamous recent case of proven fixing in cricket came a decade ago when former South Africa captain Hansie Cronje was revealed to have accepted money from bookmakers in a bid to influence the course of games as well as trying to corrupt his teammates. Cronje died in a mysterious plane crash in 2002.
