Asif '100pc sure' he’d play for Pakistan again

OSLO: Pakistan´s Mohammad Asif has ended up playing in Norway as he plots a return to Test cricket, five years after a notorious spot-fixing scandal, a report said.

Asif, 33, told the Cricinfo website he was playing with Oslo´s Christiania Cricket Club to work on his fitness and was "100 percent sure" he´d play for Pakistan again.

Asif was caught bowling no-balls to order against England at Lord´s in 2010, an offence which landed him with a jail term and a five-year ban.

"One of my friends called me to ask me to come and play some cricket," he said, of his arrival in the cricketing backwater.

"There´s good weather for training -- that´s why I came here. The cricketing standard is not too high but it´s still cricket."

Asif´s one-time new-ball partner Mohammad Amir, now 24, is back in the Pakistan squad despite his involvement in the spot-fixing and is in line to return to Test cricket -- uncannily, at Lord´s -- next month.

But Asif and Salman Butt, their former captain who was also punished over the scandal, remain outside the international fold.

"Hopefully I will do well in Pakistan and get selected for the national team for the tours to New Zealand and Australia," Asif said, referring to Pakistan´s two series from November to January.

"It´s quite difficult after five years to come down and bowl fast but I´m a different kind of bowler," he added.

"I´m not like a 100-mile bowler -- I´m more dependent on swing and seam, they´re my main weapons. My pace was always 130 or 135 kph (81-84 mph).

"This (Oslo) is a good pace for swing. I just need good fitness."