Corruption in sport has its consequences,judges warn

The message came as the Court of Appeal rejected sentence challenges by disgraced Pakistan cricketers Salman Butt and Mohammad Amir, whose involvement in a match-fixing scam “betrayed” their team, country and millions of fans of the game around the world.

Announcing the decision in London, the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge, said the court had to make clear that what they did was “not simply a matter of breaking the rules of the game” and therefore subject to internal discipline and regulation.

He added: “It is also criminal conduct of a very serious kind which must be marked with a criminal sanction.”

Former Test captain Butt, 27, who was convicted by a jury, was jailed for 30 months for his role as the “orchestrator” of a plot to bowl deliberate no-balls in the Lord’s Test against England last summer.

Amir, 19, who had been tipped to become one of the all-time great fast bowlers, was detained for six months in a young offenders institution after he admitted bowling two intentional no-balls at Lord’s.