Cronje promises to repair the damage using his illicit gains

“Maybe I was trying to cut some for myself,” he told thecourt in reply to a question over the difference between the $25,000 fee he had negotiated for Herschelle Gibbs and Henry Williams and the $15,000 they both have testified he offered them.

“It was the worst thing that happened,” he said of the offer to the two players, who in the end did not take it up. King will report to President Thabo Mbeki by June 30. Professional gambler Marlon Aronstam, who gave Cronje 53,000 rand and a black leather jacket in January this year as a down payment for future information on pitch conditions, told the inquiry on Friday Cronje had become a friend. “It hurts me more than anything else to have to sit here…and say things that harm Hansie,” he said, his voice breaking with emotion. He said the money had been a drop in the ocean for a professional gambler who could make 10 times the amount from betting on one match.

“What I have paid Mr Cronje is not a lot of money and it was worth it,” he said, adding that the former national captain had been a willing participant, even going so far as to show willing to throw a match. Aronstam said it was not in a gambler’s interests to have a match thrown, adding that no bets had been paid on a series of matches in 1994 between South Africa, Pakistan and Zimbabwe as it had been found that Pakistan had thrown the games.

PROSECUTOR FRUSTRATED: Prosecutor Shamila Batohi, who tried on Thursday to get Cronje to admit the accuracy of transcripts of telephone conversations he is alleged to have had with a bookmaker identified only as Sanjay, abandoned the attempt on Friday.In evident frustration at the end of her cross-examination Batohi accused Cronje of not revealing everything but instead holding back to see what came out of the inquiry an accusation he denied.FAMILY THREAT: A close friend of the family revealed on Thursday that Cronje’s mother and wife had told him that if he lied to the inquiry he would no longer be part of the family a serious threat to an Afrikaner, to whom the family is the foundation.

Cronje, who said he had panicked when allegations of his involvement in match-fixing on the Indian tour first emerged and had stashed money throughout his luxury home in the southern resort town of George, said he had initially lied to his wife. “If my wife discovers one more dollar in the house she’ll cut the other testicle out,” he said with a wry smile, referring to evident strain in their marriage since the scandal.

Asked if he thought he was the only cricketer who had been approached by bookmakers, Cronje said probably not. “If they cn get to me they can get to anyone,” he said. The inquiry resumes on Monday.