IPL rejects Pakistan's plea on Asif ban

NEW DELHI // The Indian Premier League (IPL) rejected today a request from the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to backdate the pace bowler Mohammad Asif's ban for a positive dope test during last year's Twenty20 tournament. The IPL's drug tribunal last week announced a one-year ban on Asif for testing positive to the prohibited substance nandrolone, and said the ban would run from Sept 23, 2008 until Sept 22, 2009.

The Pakistan board asked the IPL to backdate the ban to July 15, 2008, the date of the positive test. He has not been allowed to play representative cricket since then. "We've received a request from the Pakistan Cricket Board to advance the ban on Asif from Sept 23 to July 15, 2008, but we cannot do so," the Press Trust of India quoted the IPL chairman Lalit Modi as saying in Mumbai. Asif "could have appealed against it and then the Appeals Tribunal would have looked into it. He did not do so. The ban stays from Sept 23, 2008."

Asif has been involved in a series of controversies, including his 19-day detention at Dubai international airport last year for possessing a small amount of opium when he was returning home after playing in the IPL. *AP