The match-fixing scandal that has rocked Pakistan cricket grew in proportion on Monday with reports emerging of more games being rigged prompting a shocked cricketing fraternity to demand life bans on guilty players.
The sting operation carried out by British tabloid News of the World , which implicated seven Pakistani players including captain Salman Butt, has opened a Pandora’s Box with fresh reports suggesting that the opening Test between England and Pakistan and the January Sydney Test between Pakistan and Australia could have been fixed.
A guarded International Cricket Council (ICC) President Sharad Pawar said the allegations were very serious but the ICC would wait for a report from the police in London before deciding on its course of action.
“Until and unless the process of investigation is over, it is improper for me to react,” Mr. Pawar told reporters in Mumbai.
“We have discussed it within the ICC and have decided that let us wait for the police’s investigation report. After that we have to take a viewpoint of the two Boards, the Pakistan Cricket Board and the England and Wales Cricket Board.
“If this is established, there will be quite a serious view that will be taken by the Pakistan Cricket Board, the England Cricket Board and the ICC,” he said.
The furore follows allegations that a bookie, Mazhar Majeed, arrested and later released on bail, bribed Pakistani pacers Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Aamir for ‘spot-fixing’ to bowl no balls during the Lord’s Test against England, which the visitors lost by an innings and 225 runs.
While match-fixing involves rigging the outcome of a game, ‘spot-fixing’ means manipulating events within a match.
The reports also indicated that the first Test between England and Pakistan in the just-ended series and Pakistan and Australia in Sydney in January were also fixed.
Another report claimed that the Pakistani players were found with cash exceeding their daily allowances during a Scotland Yard raid on Saturday night.
In video of the sting operation, Majeed is seen claiming that the result of the Sydney Test was rigged and is also boasting about the money he earned from it.
“Let me tell you the last Test we did. It was the second Test against Australia in Sydney. Australia had two more wickets left. They had a lead of 10 runs, yeah. And Pakistan had all their wickets remaining.
The odds for Pakistan to lose that match, for Australia to win that match, were I think 40-1. We let them get up to 150 then everyone lost their wickets,” newspapers here quoted Majeed as saying in the sting video.
“That one we made 1.3 million pounds. But that’s what I mean, you can get up to a million. Tests are where the biggest money is because those situations arise.”
Australia clinched an unlikely 36-run win in the match after Pakistan lost nine wickets for a mere 89 runs. Pakistani Wicketkeeper Kamran Akmal dropped four catches in the match which helped Australia recover from a potentially losing situation.
The ICC’s Anti-Corruption and Security Unit had investigated the match but gave it an all-clear.
Compounding the Pakistan cricket team’s woes was a report in a British paper which claimed that the side’s players rigged the opening Test against England, which the hosts won by a massive 354 runs last month in Nottingham.
Scotland Yard’s Assistant Commissioner Cressida Dick was reportedly told about Pakistani players being involved in match fixing a month ago.
“Police were told a month ago about match-fixing in the England v Pakistan Test series. Scotland Yard’s Assistant Commissioner Cressida Dick was tipped off over alleged corruption in the first match (July 29 to August 1),” the tabloid claimed.
Quoting a source, the newspaper said that an informer had given “credible” information about match-fixing by Pakistani players to the police here.
The new revelations are bound to damage the Pakistan cricket team’s reputation even more.
The cricketers implicated in the scandal have had their mobile phones and reportedly their passports confiscated by the police.
