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Everyone and his dog
Warne & Waugh speaking to media after admitting to receiving millions of dollars from bookies for disclosing match and weather information.
Three weeks after the scandal first broke out, there is little change in the ground position. Everything said and shown from day one remains what they are: allegations. There is, indeed, the likelihood that these allegations will turn out to be true, but the chance of that happening is as much as to the contrary. This simple rule applies globally on all allegations of all sorts. The ones at hand should have been no different.
In the previous column, we had discussed the reaction of our own people — basically of pundits interested in getting ahead of the game — that was bordering on misplaced self-righteousness. Let’s have a look today at the holier-than-thou behaviour of Englishmen.
Before we do that, let’s recall the basic assumption we made in the previous episode: the trio in question is actually corrupt and there is everything wrong in Pakistan Cricket, but this has yet to be proved. This discussion is not — repeat ‘not’ — an expression of denial, neither physical nor psychological. This is just about being rational in approach and treating such things in perspective.
Let’s begin with the first reaction that came at the end of the Lord’s Test, which was also the last day of the Test series and the very day on which the allegations had been made public by a tabloid of ill repute. The English cricket board shifted the end-of-series ceremony indoors and its chief refused to shake hands with Mohammad Amir, the Man of the Series. A very strong and graphic indicator of how much weight the board accords to matters of ethics in sports.
But while the board found it below its dignity to deal with the accused, was its behaviour consistent with what it has been in the case of some of the convicts — yes, convicts, not accused? Former English captain Michael Atherton, for instance, was convicted in that infamous ‘dirt-in-the-pocket’ scandal, wasn’t he? He was caught cheating by live cameras on the field. He pleaded guilty, paid the fine and life moved on. He remained the captain and he is pursuing a career as cricket commentator, but none of it bothers the England and Wales Cricket Board (EWCB).
There are other convicts as well with whom the EWCB has been on wonderful terms. Remember Mark Waugh and Shane Warne? They admitted to taking money from the bookies, paid the fine and moved on. Warne, for good measure, also served a ban for substance abuse, but the board never found a reason or an occasion to distance itself from the player. Going a step further, that sounds a wee bit strange.
What about Herschelle Gibbs and Nike Boje? The South African duo not only paid penalties, but even refused to tour India as they feared immediate arrest on arrival because of their links with the bookies. Yet the EWCB never hesitated to play host to them. Interesting, isn’t it?
And, not to forget, even today it has as its bowling coach Mushtaq Ahmed, the man who was named and fined alongside Wasim Akram and everybody else in one of the most exhaustive match-fixing investigations ever.
Besides, the EWCB also did not find anything wrong in its embarrassing dealings with Allen Stanford who created 11 individual millionaires through winning a single match, which by far remains an unprecedented payday for a team sport. It is another story that most of these ‘millionaires’ were talked into re-investing the money in Stanford’s private bank and subsequently lost every penny because the man soon found himself languishing in prison against a $8 billion financial scam. The deal had gone through despite the furore in the media and other circles forewarning the EWCB where the lust for money was leading it to.
Having been comfortable in its dealings with all kinds of convicted cheats — ball-tampering, spot-fixing, match-fixing, substance abuse, financial fraudsters and all — the EWCB practised blatant double standards when it came to shaking hands with an accused.
There have been others — like, say, Atherton and Nasser Hussain — who have been pleading the case of Amir. “Spare the kid … he is just 18 … such a huge talent … he is from a village and was trapped,” they have been saying on air and in their writings. While it sounds very positive to many Pakistani ears, the impression it is generating is pretty damaging. When they say ‘spare the kid’, it implies that the kid in question is guilty.
The reaction such pleas have generated can be seen from what a senior British columnist recently wrote. “There is no tangled web of intrigue behind this story … Don’t for one minute give me all the bull about impoverished backgrounds and peer pressure,” he wrote.
See, everyone and his dog has already announced the verdict. Even though he has written it for an entirely different purpose, let’s quote some of his words without that malicious context. “Rich or poor, Pakistani or English, the difference between good and bad remains the same. The difference between moral and immoral does not have any class caveats, does not have any financial code … These guys were willing to cheat.”
These guys may well have been willing to cheat, but what about those who confessed to the crime and yet retained their honour in British eyes?
DAWN.COM | Magazine | Straight talk: Everyone and his dog
Thank God this bi*tch is out of cricket field for ever 
