Match fixing is one of the biggest curses any sport as seen and Cricket too has seen the worst of the match fixing saga of various proportions hit the game at various times and bring it to disrepute. The match fixing saga of 2000 or the Spot fixing of 2010 to the IPL 2013 spot fixing saga all comes to mind. Al – Jazeera a famous news channel had conducted a sting interview where they had tried to imply that the Chennai test match between India and England and the Ranchi test between India and Australia were not played within the spirit of the game and there was more to than what meets the eye.
The Story as it happened –
The year 2016 and 2017 were busy for Indian cricket with a huge Home season. Al Jazeera had conducted a sting interview in the year 2018 as there were reports that the Chennai test against England which was won by India and the 2017 Ranchi test versus Australia which was a draw was in the eye of the storm for fixing. ICC has come out and dismissed those claims and said “The programme alleged that two matches were fixed: India v England in Chennai in 2016 and India v Australia in Ranchi in 2017. To assess whether the passages of play highlighted in the programme were unusual in any way, the ICC engaged four independent betting and cricketing specialists to analyse the claim. All four concluded that the passages of play identified in the programme as being allegedly fixed were entirely predictable, and therefore implausible as a fix”
ICC clarifies its stand after its investigation –
The under-cover video showed a few bookies and a few former cricketers from India and Sri Lanka discussing various things pertaining to match –fixing. Speaking about the incident after its investigation Alex Marshall the GM for Integrity Unit at ICC said in a statement “In the case of the claims aired in this programme, there are fundamental weaknesses in each of the areas we have investigated that make the claims unlikely and lacking in credibility, a viewpoint that has been corroborated by four independent experts, On the basis of the programme, the Participants to the Code who were filmed appear to have behaved in a questionable manner, however, we have been unable to assess the full context of the conversations that took place beyond what was seen on screen versus what the Participants claim actually happened. This combined with the absence of any other credible evidence means there are insufficient grounds to bring charges under the ICC Anti-Corruption Code”.