Cricket: Pakistan pacemen Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif have been handed bans for doping offences. Shoaib (31) is banned for two years while Asif's (23) suspension is for one year.
Both players tested positive for the banned steroid nandrolone during an internal testing programme carried out by the Pakistan Cricket Board as part of their requirements prior to the ICC Champions Trophy tournament in India.
Shahid Hamid, who headed the tribunal convened to discuss the positive tests, said: "We have banned Shoaib Akhtar from playing international and domestic cricket for two years, and Mohammed Asif has been banned for one year for playing international or domestic cricket.
"We were helpless and our hands were tied."
Shoaib protested his innocence when the initial positive test was announced.
He said: "I just want to assure everyone that I am innocent of doing anything I shouldn't have. All I can say is that I have not knowingly taken any performance-enhancing drugs and would never cheat my team-mates or opponents in this way.
"I have always played the game fair and I give 100 per cent and do not feel that I need to take drugs to help my bowling."
Asif, a newcomer to the national team, has yet to comment on the matter.
Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer later speculated that the pair may have tested positive after buying over-the-counter products designed to help bulk them up, without realising the impact of their use.
"We know what we've given to the players," Woolmer said. "Our doctors, our physiotherapists, are very strict. That's why it came as a shock to me. If anything is happening outside our sphere of influence, then I don't know about it.
"That's what will worry me, if something is happening outside our sphere of influence.
"They might have been taking a build-up powder which we didn't know about and which you can pick off the shelves which has nandrolone in it, and there are substances like that.
"I don't know whether they have picked them up off the shelves. I don't have any answers unfortunately." PA