Lawrence Booth
‘Corruption report stuns cricket world,” announced one website this week. Remove cricket from that headline, and you might be closer to the truth. Because for those in the game who have followed developments closely since Cronjegate and have greeted each new revelation with less shock and horror than the last there is precious little that is new in Sir Paul Condon’s report. Stunned? We passed that stage ages ago.
And yet it was vital that a report like this was written. Condon talks of a worldwide “conspiracy of silence”, of apathy and complacency, of whistleblowers worried about their safety. When he sent a questionnaire out to players asking them whether they had been approached about match-fixing, the response was poor. But a document like this should spell it out: cooperate or you can’t play.
If the International Cricket Council (ICC) wants to be taken seriously, it must start acting seriously. Now Condon, who calls the ICC “a loose and fragile alliance”, has joined in. As a way of grabbing the ICC by the lapels and shaking some life into it, this could be the most effective method yet.
Most of the allegations simply confirm the whispers and innuendo that have insinuated themselves into the game like a match-fixer with a mobile phone. But the report does mention two new cases. The ICC Knockout Trophy in Nairobi last September and the recent New Zealand-Pakistan series are both fingered.
Events in Nairobi hardly seemed dodgy at the time, although Australia’s defeat by India and New Zealand’s semifinal win over Pakistan were both surprises. More suspicious was the New Zealand-Pakistan Test series earlier this year. Leading 1-0 with one game to go, Pakistan, who had run up 571/8 in the previous match, were dismissed for 104 and 118 by an inexperienced attack. New Zealand managed 407/4 and won by an innings. The report says that allegations into this series “are being reviewed”, and elsewhere in the report Condon insists that match-fixing is still going on. It is a damning indictment of the ICC’s impotence.
It’s good for the game that all the rumours have finally been formalised, but this report must be seen for what it is: the tip of a chilling iceberg. It’s now up to the national cricket boards to follow Condon’s lead and help root out the cheats. Only then will cricket lovers be able to trust their game again.
On Monday, the editor of Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack, Graeme Wright, was asked whether he thought England’s win over Pakistan at Lord’s had been fixed. “You just don’t know these days,” he replied. That’s what Condon and Co are up against. They’ve made a start. Now they’ve got to keep going.