Bob Woolmer

Detectives are to investigate the mystery of the “last” e-mail from Bob Woolmer, the murdered Pakistan cricket coach, amid suspicions that it was sent by his killers.

Friends of Woolmer, who was found unconscious in his hotel room in Jamaica and later died in hospital during the World Cup, say the language said to have been used in the email was categorically not that of the former England Test batsman, or even of someone who speaks English as a first language.

[Woolmer was not murdered but died of a heart failure, claimed a group of Scotland Yard detectives assisting the Jamaican Police, according to a report in a Jamaica daily on Sunday.

“The Scotland Yard report said Woolmer died of heart failure, contradicting earlier reports by the Jamaica Constabulary Force and local pathologist Dr Ere Sheshiah, who had conducted Woolmer’s post-mortem,” the paper said, quoting sources in London.

The report said the Scotand Yard findings were disclosed last week during a meeting with Shields and Superintendent Colin Pinnace, who stopped over in London, en route to South Africa.]

Part of the email, to the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), read: “I would like to praise my association with the Pakistan team but now I would like to announce my retirement after the World Cup, to live the rest of my life in Cape Town. I have no lust for the job and I will not like others to make personal remarks at me.

“Professionally, I am open to criticism, I will be ready to continue the job if the president asks me for it.”

The PCB refused to give a copy of the full email, which was apparently sent at 6 am on March 18 — less than five hours before Woolmer’s body was found by a hotel maid. The Jamaican police are also “very interested” in the email.

The friends intend to draw the wording to the attention of Mark Shields. They are confident that if reports of the email’s content are accurate, it was either not sent by him, or was sent under duress, possibly because his killers wanted to try to cover their tracks.

Woolmer’s wife read the alleged contents of the email last week for the first time and was, according to friends, “deeply dismissive” that it could have been written by her late husband.

Neil Manthorp, a South African cricket journalist and broadcaster who was one of Woolmer’s closest friends, said: “I have received hundreds of emails from him over the years and this is not his style — not the sort of words and phrases that he would use.”

Ian Chappell, the former captain of Australia, said: “I can’t believe it was written by a man whose first language was English.”

If the email proves not to have been sent by Woolmer, it will increase suspicions that one of the members of the Pakistan camp was responsible for murdering him.