Court summons PCB over Kaneria exclusion

The Pakistan board has been summoned by a Karachi court on July 26 to explain the continued exclusion of legspinner Danish Kaneria from the national team. The summons comes after the first hearing of a legal petition filed by Kaneria at the Sindh High Court on Saturday against the PCB. Kaneria's lawyer Mohammad Farogh Naseem told Associated Press that the court also asked PCB officials to not make any defamatory remarks about Kaneria.

Kaneria has not been cleared for selection to Pakistan's Test side since last October when, following the fall-out from the Lord's spot-fixing scandal and his own entanglement in a corruption case in Essex, the PCB tightened up its anti-corruption programme.

Kaneria was Pakistan's first-choice Test spinner for nearly seven years from 2003, and has played 61 Tests, taking 261 wickets. He has been excluded since last October, when he was withdrawn from the squad to face South Africa the day he was set to depart for the tour.

Last year, he was questioned by police in relation to an investigation believed to centre around a Pro40 Essex win against Durham and spot-betting on wides and no-balls during the match, but was not charged.

He has been involved in a long battle with the PCB since his exclusion, appearing before its integrity committee, but has failed to convince it despite providing communications from the ICC, Essex police and the county that he was not found guilty of corruption.