Pakistan kept in the dark, says Mir

Pakistan are being "kept in the dark" by the Jamaican Police regarding the murder of their coach Bob Woolmer according to Pervez Mir, their media manager.

Mir insisted that the "visibly disturbed" players were not being kept in the loop on the investigation. "We assisted in whatever way they [the Jamaican police] wanted, but we need an official statement from their office to notify us officially as to the causes of Mr Woolmer's death," Mir told AFP during Pakistan's stopover in London on their way home. "We heard on television that he was murdered, but we've not been officially told and we need to know the reasons for his death."

He said that Pakistan were ready to assist the police and that he had left a message for Mark Shields, Jamaica's deputy commissioner of police, "because my chairman [Nasim Ashraf] wants to know, my board wants to know, what's going on as far as the investigation is concerned and what the Jamaican police are doing to catch the killers of Mr Woolmer."

Rumours of the involvement of match-fixing in Woolmer's death have been doing the rounds but Mir sought to play them down. "When a man has been murdered, to divert a murder inquiry into a match-fixing inquiry, that's not fair, because we have to find the killers, then we will know what's happened. To bring up the murky world of match-fixing, I think it's not the right thing and not the right time."

Ashraf also strongly denied the possibility of any match-fixing links. "I am absolutely convinced, I have no information or proof that there is any corruption in Pakistani cricket at all," Ashraf told Sky Sports. "There is no idea or anything of that nature to suggest that there is any corruption involved or any match-fixing linked to the Pakistani cricket team.

"This has been a terrible ordeal, the boys have been through terrible stress. No one could have imagined that in a gentleman's came like cricket things like murder could happen so it's been a tremendous shock for all of us. We have been the victims of this dastardly crime - our boys have been through hell - so it's vital that whoever is responsible is brought to book. Our boys are on their way home to be with their families - you can imagine what their families have been going through."