By Sreelata S. Yellamrazu
It is hard to make decisions based on allegations. However, the absence of it could really strain the competition between teams. And this is exactly why Pakistan’s tour of England needed a break!
When the horror of the spot fixing allegations broke out at the fag end of the Lord’s Test, it seemed the time had come to lay down the law. After months of insinuations, indeterminate whispers, the skeletons were tumbling and from the player agent for the Pakistan cricketers himself. It was hard, based on the visual evidence, that Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Aamer did not bowl those no balls deliberately. Worse still, the manner in which Mazhar Majeed explained, it seemed even more improbable that it could have been carried out without the intentional participation of the Pakistan captain, Salman Butt, who would have ultimate control over who would bowl which over.
In that light, with the gravity of the situation being what it was, and given that the Test series had concluded, it did not make practical sense to continue the England Pakistan ODI series in the atmosphere of such high suspicion and aspersions. What followed was a diplomatic bloodbath that sunk the sport further under the sordid nexus of politics and a less than proactive governing body of sport.
It seemed rather incredulous that when the agent was speaking about the possibility of the ODI series being fixed, the ICC chose to let play carry on. The only way to thwart the possibility of the bookies making money from shady dealings with cricketers was to defer the series which would have cost them heavily as well. The decision to continue, also prompted by the England and Wales Cricket Board not wanting to lose revenue, now seems like aiding and abetting the betting syndicates and could have possibly done more harm than good for the sport because it is also highlighted the problems within the game with the continuing cloud of suspicion, the acrimony between players and the alacrity of tirades being traded.
It seemed also ridiculous that Jonathan Trott, who days ago had spoken about how the players were mindful of the situation and should himself provoke the Pakistan cricketer in question, Wahab Riaz, with a query like, “how much money will you make from bookmakers today.” Instead England should have taken a higher moral ground.
The incident was wrong on several levels. First of all, a player under investigation should not have been exposed to either team because of the ability of the home team to influence him to shut up and the ability of the opposition to needle him into a corner, irrespective of whether he is guilty or not. Secondly, the players were set up for this needless confrontation by the respective boards and the ICC because they could have avoided this entire scenario which has surprisingly sunk the series further just when one thought it could not go any further.
The idea of the cricketers at each other’s throats literally should be a poster image for the respective boards on how not making decisive, practical, sensible decisions under extenuating circumstances can really tarnish the game, at a time when restoring sensibility and sanity should be of priority. Instead by allowing a series to go on – one that is seeing any real interest from the people who really appreciate the game simply because of the off field matters that have killed the on field excitement – they have fuelled the speculation, further the allegation and allowed the atmosphere of suspicion to grow to the extent that neither team is safe in victory or in defeat and the safety of the cricketers has never been more vulnerable, and from their own contemporaries, which is perhaps the saddest aspect of the day and a real let down for the game of cricket.
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