May 24 2001

Match-fixing report released

80 PAGES AROUND THE WORLD WITH SIR PAUL CONDON

Well it has taken him more than eighty days, in fact he still has outposts of the game to trek through, quizzing the locals about their betting tomfoolery knowledge. But the report certainly has got the big names talking, and the big cricketing organizations sitting up and reacting. Whether anything physical will come about because of it is a another matter entirely. But hats off to Willy, I mean Paul for his efforts.

With English law restricting the report's naming and shaming ability, there will still be an undercurrent of rumour flying around. But behind the doors of the official cricket boards, there must be events and names that they are aware of. Only when everything is laid bare for all the world to see can we begin to clear the name of the great game. The Test nations must be ready to give the ICC the ability to wield some power over the matter, and inflict punishment worthy of the crime. The history of brushing the issue under the carpet is a saddening one for the game to face.

Particularly Mark Waugh and Shane Warne's misdemeanour of giving match information to a bookmaker. However innocuous the information may have been, it is stated in the report that they did this on a number of occasions. It was not as I believed a one-off incident. This puts their naivety or wrongdoing in a new light. Is it one rule for particular players and a less harsh one for another. I am not saying there actions were anything like as poisonous to the game has Hansie's, but what they did was against the spirit of the game all the same.

Of course, I cannot believe that Alec Stewart has been anything other than a fine example to any youngster, and that the accusations against the player of a hundred plus Test must surely be false. I thought the same about Hansie too.

But gambling is part of the chronology and genesis of the game in its earliest form, to pretend otherwise would be foolish. It is apart of life today, as is politics. Those within the game may wish neither to influence or seep into the running of cricket, but it does, and will do forever more. I do not advocate making gambling a full part of international cricket, just bring everything out into the open, the Asian heart of the melting pot of rumour and insinuation must be brought to book. That though will be the hardest part.

Condon's plan to eradicate the issue from the game at least in part by the 2003 World Cup may be a generous ideal. But there is no reason why we can not have gone a long way to making cricket a more honest sport, if the Official Test authorities really want to sort this problem out, I am sure they can.

Richard Kendall