Pak cricket officials doubt Woolmer murder claims

KARACHI: Pakistani cricket officials and players continue to remain sceptical about Jamaica police's claims that coach Bob Woolmer was murdered two weeks ago during their World Cup campaign in Kingston.

Due to the sensitive nature of the issue, officials and players are not willing to speak on record about the incident but they believe that sooner than later investigators and forensic experts in Kingston will confirm Woolmer was not murdered and died of natural causes.

"The Pakistan government was also not satisfied with the manner in which investigators in Kingston were approaching the case and thus decided to send their own senior investigators to Jamaica to observe how the investigations were held," a board source opined.

The three-member Pakistan delegation that also includes a diplomat is due to leave on Monday for Jamaica but so far there is no confirmation on whether the Jamaican authorities have agreed to allow the Pakistani investigators to play a pro-active role in the investigations into Woolmer's death.

"Everyday they come up with new theories about how Woolmer died. But from what our manager Talat Ali saw when they found Bob lying unconscious in the bathroom, they are more chances he died of natural causes rather than being murdered," one player said.

Sources say that when Woolmer was found in his bathroom two things stand out and weaken the murder theory. "One that when the doctors checked him he was breathing and secondly there was vomit all over the bathroom with traces of food he had taken in it. The theory that he might have been strangled thus becomes very weak in the above circumstances," said one source.

He said Talat and the players all felt the investigators in Kingston might have overreacted due to the intense media interest in the case and given out premature theories about Woolmer's death.

"The Pakistani investigators will also look at theories that Woolmer might have been poisoned," another source said.

The Pakistan board has even sent back Asad Mustafa, the assistant manager of the World Cup team, to Jamaica from London while he was on his way back home on Saturday.

"The board felt that Mustafa should remain in Jamaica until the body of Woolmer is sent to his hometown of Cape Town after the final post-mortem. They also want a representative there to brief the Pakistani investigators of the developments since Woolmer died on March 18," the source said.

Players, who came to attend the memorial service held for Woolmer in Lahore on Sunday, have still not gotten over the tragic death of their coach but under strict orders from the board none of them was willing to say anything publicly on the issue.