Stewart denies taking bookie's cash

"The ECB have also proposed that Sir Paul Condon .. . be asked on behalf of all the cricket boards who have had players named in the Indian government report to investigate those claims further and to see if there is any evidence to corroborate any of them. In that event the ECB will fully co-operate with Sir Paul Condon's investigations."

Sir Paul pledged to "clean up" cricket in a statement issued in London today.

He said: "This is make-your-mind-up time for players. They can either lie and face the consequences, or tell the truth.

"Players are sick and tired of being second guessed on every aspect of their endeavours on the field of play. I think my unit can make a big difference. We can make it harder for players to cheat.

"We are bringing an investigative arm to world cricket that it hasn't had before. But I am not judge and jury on these issues. There are some commonsense ways we can put into place to make sure that this never happens again."

The report by the Indian Central Bureau of Investigation alleges Stewart received the cash for supplying information about the pitch, weather and team during England's disastrous 1993 tour of India and Sri Lanka when they lost all four Tests.

Stewart, 37, one of a number of players named by the report as accepting or being offered bribes - including former captains from six countries - was captain for one of the three Tests in India when Graham Gooch was ill. Gooch later led the side in Sri Lanka as planned.

The report says Gupta, also known as MK and "John", told investigators he had paid Stewart £5,000 for information after being introduced to him by Indian all-rounder Manoj Prabhakar in 1993. However, Stewart refused to fix matches.

Stewart, not picked to play in the current match in Rawalpindi, today relaxed by a swimming pool at the team hotel. He had first become aware that his name appeared in the report yesterday evening and admitted to a journalist he had a sleepless night.

His father, former England manager Micky Stewart, said: "It's been a very unpleasant thing for my wife and the family to hear and read, and it's all speculation.

"Anything that is in the report, or what I've seen ... in the papers, is in total contrast to the person that he is, and the way he's lived his life and the huge regard he's got for the game of cricket."

The report also names Indian former captain Mohammed Azharuddin, West Indian Brian Lara, Australians Mark Waugh and Dean Jones, South African Hansie Cronje, Sri Lankans Aravinda de Silva and Arjuna Ranatunga, New Zealander Martin Crowe and Pakistani Salim Malik.

Crowe said he was tricked into taking money from Gupta, who had represented himself as a journalist. Gupta alleged that he paid Crowe £14,000 for pitch, weather and team information in 1992. Crowe, who retired in 1995, said he thought he was being paid to write newspaper columns.

"I wasn't actually paid by the bookmaker," Crowe said. "But it was obviously an organised scam to collect information and, once I realised what was going on, I knocked it on the head."

Indian investigators have been probing the match-rigging scandal since they accidentally uncovered Cronje's involvement with bookmakers earlier this year.

Cricket authorities around the world will be forced to take action if all or any of the information seeping out today is confirmed by the Bureau report.

Under International Cricket Council policy on match fixing, the options open to the game's governors in dealing with those found guilty of providing information for financial reward include a five-year ban.

That relates to anyone supplying information on "weather, teams, state of ground, status or match outcome", although the ICC added a caveat that their stated policy is intended to deal with offences taking place after 1 July, 1993. The England tour took place before that.