Cricket's dilemma

alexsandr

How can Pakistan play in the international game until they have cut this cancer out of their game.

Nicholas Hallam

If the allegations prove well-founded, the Pakistani cricketers involved must be banned for life. Far from weakening Pakistani cricket, I believe this would strengthen it. As things stand I cannot imagine parting with money to watch Pakistan play.

Tiberius

If the charges are proved, then cricket in general would be weakened if the convicted cheats (indeed criminals) were allowed to continue to play.

Tankus

The whole team should have been sent home.

Dysgwr Cymraeg

If I hear "If the allegations are proved" once more i'll scweam and scweam!!
Holy moses what kind of evidence does one need to prove this ?

Walsingham's Ghost

"If the allegations against the men turn out to be correct, then the game will have to decide how to punish them."

1] The 'fixer' told the undercover Reporter that 'No Balls' would be bowled at very specific times -they were.

2] A 'Life Ban' in Pakistani cricketing terms means about 3 months.

3] When Sir Paul Condon produced his Report into the extent of match fixing in world cricket, he concluded that match fixing was rife within the sport and that it would remain so, since it is almost impossible to police. This would be the case even if there was a will within the various governing bodies of cricket to tackle it – the fact that Life Bans on Pakistani cricketers are almost inevitably overturned after 3 months indicates no such will exists.

International Cricket is 'going to Hell in a hand-basket' while its so-called governing bodies wring their hands and pontificate...

WG

Maggie

The England team should refuse to play against Pakistan. If the various grounds insist that the games should continue because they can't afford to lose the gate money, then they're no better than the smirking Pakistani players. They also were prepared to sacrifice their good name and their integrity for money.

justathought

If the accused are guilty then there is little alternative than they be given a lifetime ban. Cheating of any kind in sport must be firmly dealt with if it is not to bring the game into disrepute and suspicion.

To suggest that somehow Pakistan would be "deprived" by removing a few individuals guilty of cheating is a disrespect to the 170 million Pakistanis.

There can be no doubt from a population the size of Pakistan that this proud country can replace those who fall short of acceptable standards in cricket.

Martyn Rowe

The sad thing is that Amir and Asif are potentially the best opening bowling partnership in the world at the moment.

Spot fixing or not, they still bettered England and Australia's batsmen all summer.

I'm gutted it has happened. Pakistan light up the cricket world when they are on their game. It is such a pity that their naive and unprotected young cricketers are surrounded by politicians, charlatans and match-fixers.

We can blame the players all we like, but I bet it is pretty intimidating saying NO to some of the nutjobs they are surrounded by.

Nicholas Hallam

Maggie, a spectator boycott is always possible if they persist with the series. The grounds can't make people turn up to watch something that they suspect has been fixed.

Beer Moth

The latest angle on this from the BBC, is that these players 'may have been the victims of a set-up'.

No doubt there are lawyers right now poring over the details with a view to litigation against the evil reporters who have brought this shame upon the sport and upon these three poor men, who were only trying to earn enough money, during what is a desperately short career, to send home to build schools and hospitals, and whose shit smells of rasperry ripple your honour.

Ahmed Khan

If guilty, these player MUST be banned for life. The fact the Pakistani national team might be weakened should not come into the consideration!

The Pakistani authorities should look at their own organization to rout out this corruption. I certainly will not see Pakistan play at any level until I am convinced by PCB’s action that the problems have been totally eradicated. It appears to me that the part of the problem is the PCB.

However, on a wider note, this problem of match-fixing or spot-fixing is much, much bigger than it first appears. The scale of this is difficult to imagine in England or Australia but is widespread especially in the Asian countries of India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and even South Africa.

The ICC will make noises about eradicating these issues but in many ways are helpless to do anything, simply because for many members of the ICC, the corrupt bookies are the paymasters. It is unfortunate fact of live that although the ICC is an International body, it is none the less virtually controlled by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

The Pakistani board must take drastic action to regain the confidence of the International follower’s of the Noble game or must accept the game will die in Pakistan. In the past the PCB has not acted honorably (remember the Nadrol scandal) and my guess is they will try to brush this issue away and get the Asian ICC members on their side and polarize the game between non-white and white playing countries.

On a positive note let it be clear that although the International game is badly tarnished, the grass root, Village Green game is still very much alive and kicking and played in the Noblest of spirit’s.

strapworld

If the ECB had any honour they would approach the Australian, Weat Indies and New Zealand cricket boards and all resign from the ICC.

Only then will world cricket, possibly, deal with this cancer.

But when the chairman of the ECB could not get his hands in thr trough with that man who is facing verys serious fraud charges. It shows that even the ECB has some serious questions to ask itself.

Sadly, money controls sport these days. We all know that the Olympic Committee is riddled with allegations of corruption, as is Fifa.We have had cheating in our national game for years! Next will it be tennis? Cliff Richard would be mortified!

TGF UKIP

Pakistani cricket merely mirrors Pakistani society with corruption rife at all levels with no one more overtly corrupt on a grand scale than its President.

The tempting thing to say is for cricket to treat Pakistan as a pariah but that has its separate political problems given the centrality of cricket in Pakistani society. Unfortunately, the more Pakistan is internationally ostracized the more headway its Islamist militants will make.

Nuclear Pakistan is in many ways the most frightening nation on earth.

ollie

"But on the other, depriving Pakistan of two cricketers of the talents of Amir and Asif would further weaken Pakistani cricket."

This should not be taken into any consideration whatsoever. There is a reason why Lady Justice is blindfolded - to stop emotions driving justice instead of logic.

Trev

strapworld,money might well rule sport but money doesn't rule me.If people are stupid enough to keep watching corrupt sports then they deserve everything they get.Personally i have done with the lot,there isnt one sport anymore i can honestly say hand on heart there isnt some sort of fiddling going on.If people stop watching the ruling bodies have to take notice.

Simon Stephenson

Has it actually been established that there has been a criminal fraud committed here? Did anyone place a bet on specific deliveries being no-balls in the knowledge that they had been "fixed" to be so?

Or was the basis of this "-gate" the fact that unlike many other places, Pakistan is an authoritarian country in which there are severe repercussions for not doing as you are told? Is it really correct to build up indignation against a group of individuals on the assumption that they are able to exert the same level of free-will in their lives as they would had the been brought up in England or Australia?

Assuming there is no difference between national cultures and worldviews makes it much less complicated to design a structure of expected virtue, but it doesn't make such a structure workable.

Ahmed Khan

@TGF UKIP

For goodness sake get your facts right before you comment!

I suppose you think that Hansje Cronje was Pakistani, together with Mark Waugh, and Azzraudin.

Beer Moth

Simon Stephenson

Para 1...Yes.

Para2...Yes.

Para3...So we are to make allowances for 'national cultures and worldviews' in which the taking of bribes is considered the norm?

Simon Stephenson

Beer Moth : 8.48pm

Para 1 - You obviously know more than I do about this. As far as I was aware it hasn't yet been established that a legal fraud has actually taken place here.

Paras 2 and 3 - The point I'm trying to make is that if the idea is to impose Western standards of behaviour on non-Western peoples there will be resistance to such an extent that it won't work. Just as much as if non-Westerners seek to impose their behavioural norms on Western people.

Starting from the concept that there is a universal set of rights and wrongs to which all people will be happy to adhere if given the chance is the stuff of pipe-dreams. Far better to be realistic and try to construct something that is possible, rather than to tear your hair out trying to achieve something that is only possible if a ridiculous assumption turns out to be true. Isn't it?

Clear Memories

And now the ICC have flung them out, which should have been the correct action by Pakistan.

Of course, Wajid Hassan, The Pakistani High Comissioner, has claimed 'they were set up', effectively playing the victim card at what is a very early stage. No Mr Comissioner, they were not set up, they are just typical Pakistanis, venal and corrupt, grasping as much as they can.

I expect the 'floods' card to be played next, pleading for more money from the dumb westerners as a diversion.

I hope our government remembers the comments and actions of this nasty little man, verging as they are on racism, and asks Pakistan to recall him as soon as possible. This whole, sorry business is just a reflection of this awful nations grasping attitude where the West is concerned.

GeoffM

If these guys get off due to intimidation and threats from Pakistan, or receive a conveniently lenient sentence, then cricket will suffer massively.

Just remember - the team has a history of dishonesty and cheating. This latest episode is just another crime that has been found out - how many have NOT?

Pakistan should be made an international pariah until it PROVES it has cleaned up its act.

The attitude of the High Commissioner just shows that they are as dishonest and manipulative as ever.

Beer Moth

Simon Stephenson

Don't you think that 'non-Western peoples' might be offended by your assertion that honesty and integrity are qualities which they do not recognise and respect?

JohnAnt

I am concerned that Pakistan may have sent us, as High Commissioner, someone who is apparently incapable of basic logical thought.
It's fairly obvious that the odds against three no-balls occurring in this particular match at all three precisely predicted points, and in the way they did, are infinitesimal.
How does the High Commissioner propose to explain this freak of nature? And what method did he use to determine by 'talking' with the three suspects that they are 'entirely innocent'?

Nicholas Hallam

JohnAnt, I think that the Pakistani High Commissioner is pinning his hopes on the very long shot that the video was made after the no-balls.

He hasn't explained why Mazhar Majeed would choose to incriminate himself in the making of this video. Neither does this version of events account for the bundles of marked cash allegedly found in Butt's possession -earmarked for his sister's dowry apparently.

Simon Stephenson

Beer Moth : 4.39pm

I think it's a bit rich lecturing non-Westerners about honesty, when the entire Western political and economic system is based upon the model of persuading people that something that isn't true, is true.

Beer Moth

Simon Stephenson

Aah, there we have it: three Pakistani cricketers are caught taking bribes, and it turns out that this can be looked upon as an inevitable reaction to the grasping tendrils of Western capitalism.

(Did we have any thoughts, by the way, on exactly what it is that places non-Westerners outside the framework of honesty and integrity, and precludes them from recognising such? Still wondering)

Simon Stephenson

Beer Moth : 7.49pm

"Aah, there we have it: three Pakistani cricketers are caught taking bribes, and it turns out that this can be looked upon as an inevitable reaction to the grasping tendrils of Western capitalism."

No, this is not what I am saying at all.

You, as an individual, may be whiter-than-white, in which case you are justified in criticising a group of people who have strayed from what you believe to be proper behaviour. What you are not entitled to do, in my opinion, is to assert that this behaviour is an affront to Western standards generally, because, as I have suggested, the central basis of Western politics and economic markets has in recent years become precisely the sort of "dishonesty for advantage" for which you criticise Amir, Asif and Butt.

By all means lament the fact that this sort of thing takes place, but don't try to pretend that it is endemic only in far away places that you deem to have a sub-standard culture.

Beer Moth

Simon Stephenson.

My behaviour and status is not here under scrutiny. These people have taken bribes and that, somewhat uncomfortably for those with your relativist leanings, happens to be frowned upon in all cultures.

Yes, this sort of thing takes place the world over and when it does, we need to recognise it. I did not argue that their behaviour is anything as grand as 'an affront to Western standards'. My view is a much more pragmatic one: that they have let their country, their team-mates and their sport down. It is some ridiculous leap that you make, when you invoke 'the central basis of Western politics and economic markets' as having anything to do with this episode.

It is you, not me who has indirectly asserted that there is something sub-standard about the culture these men belong to, by suggesting - in your warped relativism - that that culture does not place any importance on honesty and integrity, and that this shortcoming exists merely on the grounds that it is non-Western.

Western culture does not have the copyright on these qualities, and non-Western cultures do not exist merely in as far as they oppose or negate the values of the West. I'm sure they would not be too pleased to learn that they are being defined by such vulgar calculations.

Simon Stephenson

Beer Moth : 9.49pm

You make it sound as though I am suggesting that there is a weakness or illogicality in the argument that links your hypothesis with its conclusion. I'm not. If there is a universal scale of rights and wrongs by level of seriousness, and if your estimation is correct of the place on this scale the Pakistani cricketers' actions should take, then the conclusions of your argument are quite correct.

I'm merely asking "what if your assumption of universality is a false picture of what is actually the case?" And, as a follow up, "what if you are allowing personal bias to influence the position on the scale the behaviour should be allocated?"

I'm sorry that I should need to have to raise these questions, but the way the modern world seems to have decided to convert possibilities into certainties is to construct arguments on the basis that assumptions may be taken as facts. Erroneously, in my opinion.

But perhaps, with your agreement, we could leave it there.