The first whiff of sleaze in the game came in 1994-95 when an Indian bookmaker offered money to Australia cricketers Mark Waugh and Shane Warne in exchange for information related to pitch and weather conditions. Sadly, even after 19 years greed and deceit still shadow the game as the indictment recently of three Indian Premier League players - S Sreesanth, Ankeet Chavan and Ajit Chandila - in a spot fixing case shows. The latest explosive news is the supposed involvement of Bangladesh cricketers in spot fixing during the Bangladesh Premier League. This has ignited controversy in the country as Bangladesh has traditionally been viewed as the sober son of international cricket. Under the eyes of the law everyone is innocent until proven guilty as the matter is still under investigation. Interestingly no names have been named, leading to increased media speculation as to who is under investigation. But this is not the first time Bangladesh has been targeted by match fixers. Back in March 2008 a brief phone call was made on the eve of an ODI series against Ireland in which Shakib al Hasan was offered “sponsorship” in return for his under-performance. Shakib immediately reported the approach to a Bangladesh Cricket Board official and to ACSU’s regional manager, and never heard from the caller again. Bangladesh had been expected to win the series by a comfortable margin of 3-0. Shakib talked about it at before the start of the series against England at Lords, “I didn’t talk to him much because we had a team meeting to go to, so I told him I will talk to you later, and immediately I informed this to a BCB member and also the ICC guy.” Under such scrutiny, match fixing took a backseat for a while and it looked like the scourge had been eliminated. But cricket world was shocked again in 2010 when a new phrase entered its lexicon, “spot fixing”. Spot fixing is more difficult to detect as it involves betting on individual deliveries in a match. Match fixing involved a couple of players and influenced the result of a match whereas spot fixing could be done by an individual at any point and time in a match – for instance Mohammed Amir bowling a huge no-ball at Lords in a Test versus England. It was a shocking end of career for three of Pakistan’s leading cricketers Mohammad Asif, Mohammad Amir and Salman Butt along with their agent Mazhar Majeed was sentenced to jail and banned from cricket. Meanwhile, Bangladesh cricket is now going through a difficult phase where the fixing scandal could blow up if any current cricketers are found guilty and sentenced to jail. This could hamper Bangladesh cricket’s image and for the sober son of international cricket, it’s a fate worse than death.
Thursday, April 25, 2024
