Was offered $200,000 to bowl badly, alleges Shane Warne

Shane Warne and his bagful of tricks were a hit on the pitch during his heydays, but the taint of match-fixing allegations involving the Australian great, left on the game in the wake of the 'bribing' controversy in 1994-95, has refused to die down.

24 years after the incident, Warne has revealed the story behind the scandal where Pakistan cricketer Saleem Malik tried to bribe him and Mark Waugh to lose a game in Karachi.

Speaking to NDTV about his controversy-ridden autobiography titled 'No Spin', Warne has divulged details behind the unfurling of the entire scandal.

"Saleem Malik offered me $200,000, he said it will be in my room in half-an-hour if I bowl wide of the off-stump and the match was a draw. That's the bottom line of what he asked," Warne said.

Back in 1995, the trio of Warne, Waugh and Tim May had testified that Malik tried to bribe them to lose the 1994 game at Karachi. While Mark Waugh scored 61 in Australia's second innings, Waugh took a fifer in Pakistan's chase of 314, which they eventually completed with just a wicket to spare.

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Another controversy that was laid bare during that time was when Waugh and Warne were given money by an Indian bookmaker named 'John', in exchange for information on pitch and weather conditions during the Singer Cup in 1995.

An independent inquiry was held in February 1995 by the ACB, who reported the incident to the ICC, and Warne and Waugh were fined $8000 and $10,000 respectively. The whole story was later made public by the media in 1998.

While Malik continued playing cricket until 1999, he had to end his career in dishonour as he was handed a life ban in May 2000. The ban was lifted by the Pakistan Cricket Board in 2008.