There have been too many rumours about Pakistani cricket over the years for me not to be surprised by any of these allegations. Jusr recently the Pakistani team were accused of throwing away a Test in Australia where they held a commanding lead and yet somehow Australia won. If something good does come out of this it will be that the ICC will be forced to take action and the PCB must sort their house out and not go into denial.
With my cricketing head on a shame that these allegations involve Amir, unquestionably the brightest talent to arrive on the international scene for some time. The spell of bowling on Friday morning was out of this world - four English batsmen snared for no runs in nine deliveries, even in helpful conditions that was an amazing spell, every ball on the spot, and zipping away late with asuccession of good batsmen powerless to avoid the edge, or in Colly's case a plumb LBW decision.So good and accurate was that spell that I can't believe that the no balls were accidental, he had total command of length, line abd action. You simply don't over-step by that distance accidentally.
Maybe I'm being naive, but I can't believe that he's taken a few bungs voluntarily, at 18 with his career ahead of him with T20 cricket making even ordinary players seriously rich he will receive plenty of generous offers for him to have turned down the few K on offer. Pakistani cricket though is a lot like their society - very deferential and if the boss says do something, you tend to do it.
There's been a bit of an over-reaction to this stuff with people now talking about the results themselves being fixed which is, in my view total nonsense.
Take the Sydney Test Match between Australia and Pakistan, which some are claiming was fixed, there is no way that is true when you look at the facts of what happened.
The Aussies only won that game thanks to a 123 run stand for the 9th wicket in their second innings between Hussey and Siddle. I watched all of that part of the game and Siddle survived a couple of massive LBW shouts and rejected appeals for close-in catches whilst the Aussie lead was only around 50 or 60 runs.
If any of those appeals had been upheld - which is obviously totally a matter for the umpire - then Pakistan would have been chasing paltry total and would have won the game.
As it was the 123 run stand helped the Aussies set 175 to win and the Pakistani's were bowled out for 139.
The cheating clearly refers to these no-balls and other peripheral stuff rather than actually being match-fixing itself although the whole thing is still a complete disgrace.
More worryingly, it was only rumbled by the News of the Screws rather than the ICC or local law enforcement!!!!
I don't normally like the analogy but once a character involved with rigging bets gets into an international cricketer I can imagine it would be pretty impossible to get out of for the cricketer.
It casts doubt over results absolutely, and it will lead to other, more serious things. It is dishonest and corrupt.
Amir will have to be a casualty I am afraid along with the captain and Asif. I'm aware of what goes on on the sub-continent and don't believe they should be allowed into the international arena until the house is tidy and beyond reproach. Who can honestly say where things have to go to before time is called?
Butt, Asif and Amir should be stood down immediately pending the conclusion of the investigation.
If they are found guilty - and the evidence against the two bowlers looks solid - then allowing them to play in these ODI's will be seen to be an awful decision.
Saw some footage earlier of the game v The Aussies that they lost from an unloseable position.
The wicketkeeper (Kamran Akmal ?) missed the most easy run out you could imagine and also dropped the most easy catches. There were other dropped catches as well which were hard to believe.
I have to say their catching against us has been apalling (worse than The Bangladehi's) and some of the fielders haven't dived to stop the ball like all cricketers do these days.
I thought they were incompetent, but with hindsight I do believe they were dropping catches on purpose. Only my supposition of course.
The Aussies only won that game thanks to a 123 run stand for the 9th wicket in their second innings between Hussey and Siddle. I watched all of that part of the game and Siddle survived a couple of massive LBW shouts and rejected appeals for close-in catches whilst the Aussie lead was only around 50 or 60 runs.
.............
I'd like to think that Siddle (who set his highest Test score in that innings) and Hussey set up a victory from the jaws of defeat with no undue influence, but Mohammad Yousuf (the Pakistani captain) set very defensive fields and allowed a lot of easy runs - why would he do that when he had the Australians all but beaten? Furthermore Kamran Akmal, the keeper - under suspicion here, missed a stumping and there were several dropped catches.
Then with Pakistan needing 176 to win they spectacularly collapsed losing their last nine wickets for 89 runs, I don't recall any of the Pakistani batsmen fighting in the manner of Siddle and Hussey, when crease occupation and sensible shot selection alone would have seen them home and dry.
Even the PCB smelt a rat after the tour - sacking Yousuf as captain
[cite]Posted By: Covered End[/cite]Saw some footage earlier of the game v The Aussies that they lost from an unloseable position.
The wicketkeeper (Kamran Akmal ?) missed the most easy run out you could imagine and also dropped the most easy catches. There were other dropped catches as well which were hard to believe.
I have to say their catching against us has been apalling (worse than The Bangladehi's) and some of the fielders haven't dived to stop the ball like all cricketers do these days.
I thought they were incompetent, but with hindsight I do believe they were dropping catches on purpose. Only my supposition of course.
That's a tough one, Akmal is such an awful keeper that it is very hard to separate general incompetence from any skull-duggery.
One thing I thought was VERY suspicious was the fact that Akmal was dropped for the 2nd Test and his replacement (Zainqarnin) came in and scored 80 or 90 and then suffered a mysterious injury which allowed Akmal to come back in for the 3rd Test.....
To be fair Akmal played well at the Oval - batted responsibly and kept well. Apart from that his keeping has been dire - quite seriously I've seen better keepers in league cricket. He stands too far back, has missed simple catches and stumpings and then mysteriosly replaced Haider who cracked a finger at Edgbaston, yet apparently was keeping in practice with no ill effects. Ulmar Gul injured his hamstring at Edgbaston too an immediate announcement was made that he was out for the next two Tests, I wondered at the time how they could have made that decision before knowing the extent of his injury and he too was bowling at full pace in practice sessions.
The more and more I think about this the more and more I think it is going to get swept by by the ICC and that makes me feel a bit sick.
In all honesty what has the game come to when even one of the finest left-armers I've seen for as long as I can remember is involved? And for money? For me as a totally under-average cricketer representing your country in the test arena is the greatest honour? But to sully that because you get ONLY £50,000 (guestimate) for spending your working life touring the world playing a game?? Sorry, parity in pay or not that is not on. Until they are rid of all this shite Pakistan should be indefinitely barred from world cricket
Playing devils advocate here but if you came from a poor family and were getting 50k a year and were then offered, at a guess 200k , to throw a seasons matches and possibly help secure some of your familys future and you were pretty sure you weren't going to get caught, then maybe it isn't as black and white as it seems, until actually in that position none of us can really judge what our own actions would be
Saying that some of them may just be thieving cheating scum !
One thing that has been mentioned which throws the actual match-fixing into suspicion is that in the first 2 tests the Pakistan catching and fielding was truly abysmal, then suddenly in the third test they caught and held onto everything. Just coincidence that they all got better at fielding overnight? Add that to the fact they scored 80 in the first test and 72 in the second test, it surely gives the impression the first 2 tests were deliberately lost.
And another thing i don't understand is if you're a bookie and some syndicate comes to you asking to put a huge bet on when there will be a no ball bowled, surely you'd think that was highly suspect and something untoward was going on?
[cite]Posted By: oohaahmortimer[/cite]Playing devils advocate here but if you came from a poor family and were getting 50k a year and were then offered, at a guess 200k , to throw a seasons matches and possibly help secure some of your familys future and you were pretty sure you weren't going to get caught, then maybe it isn't as black and white as it seems, until actually in that position none of us can really judge what our own actions would be
Saying that some of them may just be thieving cheating scum !
I suspect it has more to do with peer pressure, and if the allegations are correct then it was Salman Butt ordering Amir to bowl the no-balls and in Pakistani cricket if the captain asks you to do something you comply. With the money on offer for a player like Amir in IPL he had no need to take a bung now - in a couple of years he could be earning millions, so you could also put it down to poor advice from his management team. Then again he might have thought what's a couple of no balls? No harm done there, and he may have been aware that other players were getting bungs for bowling/batting and fielding poorly. Given the poor wages that the Pakistani players were on they no doubt saw this as a bonus.
What I think is clear is that the no balls were or are the tip of the iceberg. There has been so much poor cricket not just in this and recent Test series and so many rumours about match fixing involving Pakistan for the problem to be endemnic. The NoTW sting uncovered one small aspect of the story, but there's a lot more going on that is yet to come out.
Comments
With my cricketing head on a shame that these allegations involve Amir, unquestionably the brightest talent to arrive on the international scene for some time. The spell of bowling on Friday morning was out of this world - four English batsmen snared for no runs in nine deliveries, even in helpful conditions that was an amazing spell, every ball on the spot, and zipping away late with asuccession of good batsmen powerless to avoid the edge, or in Colly's case a plumb LBW decision.So good and accurate was that spell that I can't believe that the no balls were accidental, he had total command of length, line abd action. You simply don't over-step by that distance accidentally.
Maybe I'm being naive, but I can't believe that he's taken a few bungs voluntarily, at 18 with his career ahead of him with T20 cricket making even ordinary players seriously rich he will receive plenty of generous offers for him to have turned down the few K on offer. Pakistani cricket though is a lot like their society - very deferential and if the boss says do something, you tend to do it.
Take the Sydney Test Match between Australia and Pakistan, which some are claiming was fixed, there is no way that is true when you look at the facts of what happened.
The Aussies only won that game thanks to a 123 run stand for the 9th wicket in their second innings between Hussey and Siddle. I watched all of that part of the game and Siddle survived a couple of massive LBW shouts and rejected appeals for close-in catches whilst the Aussie lead was only around 50 or 60 runs.
If any of those appeals had been upheld - which is obviously totally a matter for the umpire - then Pakistan would have been chasing paltry total and would have won the game.
As it was the 123 run stand helped the Aussies set 175 to win and the Pakistani's were bowled out for 139.
The cheating clearly refers to these no-balls and other peripheral stuff rather than actually being match-fixing itself although the whole thing is still a complete disgrace.
More worryingly, it was only rumbled by the News of the Screws rather than the ICC or local law enforcement!!!!
I don't normally like the analogy but once a character involved with rigging bets gets into an international cricketer I can imagine it would be pretty impossible to get out of for the cricketer.
It casts doubt over results absolutely, and it will lead to other, more serious things. It is dishonest and corrupt.
Amir will have to be a casualty I am afraid along with the captain and Asif. I'm aware of what goes on on the sub-continent and don't believe they should be allowed into the international arena until the house is tidy and beyond reproach. Who can honestly say where things have to go to before time is called?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/cricket/england/8953417.stm
What a farce.
Butt, Asif and Amir should be stood down immediately pending the conclusion of the investigation.
If they are found guilty - and the evidence against the two bowlers looks solid - then allowing them to play in these ODI's will be seen to be an awful decision.
The wicketkeeper (Kamran Akmal ?) missed the most easy run out you could imagine and also dropped the most easy catches. There were other dropped catches as well which were hard to believe.
I have to say their catching against us has been apalling (worse than The Bangladehi's) and some of the fielders haven't dived to stop the ball like all cricketers do these days.
I thought they were incompetent, but with hindsight I do believe they were dropping catches on purpose. Only my supposition of course.
.............
Here's the scorecard for that game:
http://www.cricinfo.com/ausvpak09/engine/current/match/406200.html
I'd like to think that Siddle (who set his highest Test score in that innings) and Hussey set up a victory from the jaws of defeat with no undue influence, but Mohammad Yousuf (the Pakistani captain) set very defensive fields and allowed a lot of easy runs - why would he do that when he had the Australians all but beaten? Furthermore Kamran Akmal, the keeper - under suspicion here, missed a stumping and there were several dropped catches.
Then with Pakistan needing 176 to win they spectacularly collapsed losing their last nine wickets for 89 runs, I don't recall any of the Pakistani batsmen fighting in the manner of Siddle and Hussey, when crease occupation and sensible shot selection alone would have seen them home and dry.
Even the PCB smelt a rat after the tour - sacking Yousuf as captain
That's a tough one, Akmal is such an awful keeper that it is very hard to separate general incompetence from any skull-duggery.
One thing I thought was VERY suspicious was the fact that Akmal was dropped for the 2nd Test and his replacement (Zainqarnin) came in and scored 80 or 90 and then suffered a mysterious injury which allowed Akmal to come back in for the 3rd Test.....
In all honesty what has the game come to when even one of the finest left-armers I've seen for as long as I can remember is involved? And for money? For me as a totally under-average cricketer representing your country in the test arena is the greatest honour? But to sully that because you get ONLY £50,000 (guestimate) for spending your working life touring the world playing a game?? Sorry, parity in pay or not that is not on. Until they are rid of all this shite Pakistan should be indefinitely barred from world cricket
Saying that some of them may just be thieving cheating scum !
And another thing i don't understand is if you're a bookie and some syndicate comes to you asking to put a huge bet on when there will be a no ball bowled, surely you'd think that was highly suspect and something untoward was going on?
I suspect it has more to do with peer pressure, and if the allegations are correct then it was Salman Butt ordering Amir to bowl the no-balls and in Pakistani cricket if the captain asks you to do something you comply. With the money on offer for a player like Amir in IPL he had no need to take a bung now - in a couple of years he could be earning millions, so you could also put it down to poor advice from his management team. Then again he might have thought what's a couple of no balls? No harm done there, and he may have been aware that other players were getting bungs for bowling/batting and fielding poorly. Given the poor wages that the Pakistani players were on they no doubt saw this as a bonus.
What I think is clear is that the no balls were or are the tip of the iceberg. There has been so much poor cricket not just in this and recent Test series and so many rumours about match fixing involving Pakistan for the problem to be endemnic. The NoTW sting uncovered one small aspect of the story, but there's a lot more going on that is yet to come out.
As a result, the rich pickings of the IPL are off limits for the Pakistanis....
They are also currently banned from playing against India, which was previously their biggest money spinner.
In addition, as you already know, they are no longer allowed to play at home which destroys their income stream.