Three Pakistan cricket players questioned by British police over claims they were involved in a spot-fixing scandal returned home to protests by angry cricket-lovers yesterday.

Test team captain Salman Butt and bowlers Muhammad Aamer and Muhammad Asif landed in the eastern city of Lahore in time for the Muslim holiday of Eid, arriving at 4.20 a.m. on a Kuwait Airways flight from London.

A few hundred protesters picketed the airport with banners and waved shoes as a sign of the ­players’ disgrace.

But they did not get a chance to confront the accused three as the players were whisked away through a back exit.

Police questioned the three over claims in the News of the World that they took money to deliberately bowl no-balls in a Test match against England at Lord’s last month.

The players, who have denied any wrongdoing, were released without charge after being quizzed at a London police ­station on September 3.

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