The Pakistan coach’s death has corrupted the international game irrevocably, says stephen fay |
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The murder of Bob Woolmer in Jamaica is shattering. No matter who murdered the Pakistan coach or why, a stench has begun to rise, and it will get worse.
Since the Jamaican police cannot satisfy the intense international curiosity about Woolmer's death, speculation fills the vacuum. Consequently, it is now taken for granted that the murder was a by-product of compulsive gambling on a large scale on one-day cricket matches, especially in the Indian sub-continent.
The former chairman of the Pakistan cricket board, a respected former diplomat named Shaharyar Khan, has suddenly informed the BBC he believes episodes in matches are regularly fixed. This is known as spot-fixing, and it means gamblers bet on how many runs are scored in an over, or the score, or the wickets down after a given number of overs. |
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Khan was saying publicly what close observers of the Pakistan team have been claiming since the last match-fixing scandal in 2000, but cricket authorities have preferred to ignore them.
Michael Vaughan, England's captain, has admitted to a gut feeling corruption is still rife in international cricket. But it took Woolmer's death to bring out this startling admission.
Woolmer's wide experience in South Africa and Pakistan would have acquainted him with patterns of corruption in modern cricket. The two books by him to be published shortly appear to contain nothing about corruption.
But we know now that he had resigned as Pakistan's coach, and he might well have been in the mood to reveal what he had learned - about the behaviour of members of his Pakistan team, and about Hansie Cronje's corruption when captain of South Africa.
These cases may or may not be a motive for murder, but the fact that they are flowing out of the gutter now mean that international cricket is changed, maybe for ever. 
FIRST POSTED MARCH 27, 2007
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