Sport fixing

[omdaddi]

Does anyone else think that the recent furore over spot fixing is somewhat too focussed on one team in one sport. I have these thoughts:

• innocent until proven guilty - not the other way around?
• if guilty is it only one team?
• if guilty is it only one sport?

I personally find it hard to believe that a sample of 1 team in 1 sport means that spot fixing (if proven) is only restricted to that team in that sport.

Maybe as a massive cricket fan I am clinging to straws. I guess I have a vested interest.

[tolman]

Does anyone else think that the recent furore over spot fixing is somewhat too focussed on one team in one sport.

Generally, in any case of specific allegations, attention will be focussed on the people the allegations are being made about.

I personally find it hard to believe that a sample of 1 team in 1 sport means that spot fixing (if proven) is only restricted to that team in that sport.

If the allegations were shown to be true, I doubt that many people would assume that dodgy things can't be happening anywhere else, not least because dodgy things are already acknowledged to have happened elsewhere in cricket, and various other sports are heavily suspected of having underhand things happening even at times when there aren't specific allegations being made.

For example, I doubt many people could put their hand of their heart and claim horse-racing was entirely straight, not least because the borderline between straight and bent is actually somewhat blurred.
There are varying degrees to which someone might legitimately push a horse, it can be hard to be entirely uninfluenced by the fact that if you know part way through a race that you really aren't going to get a prize-winning place, then failing to push the horse to the utmost, and ending up somewhere behind where you might have ended up might enable the horse's owner and their friends you to get better odds in a future race.
Apart from blatant cases, it can be very hard to prove that someone wasn't trying, not least because horses can have off-days even when they actually have been perfectly prepared for a race, and no-one can easily question a horse.

To an extent, the cynical person might well assume that much dodgy stuff *might* be happening, wondering whether a particular cyclist/track athlete actually won with or without the aid of drugs, whether a particular sport was or wasn't being fixed for betting purposes, etc.
Nevertheless, on the occasions when someone actually does end up being shown to have put gain ahead of sportsmanship, that doesn't mean that even the cynical person isn't justified in looking down on the culprit, whether for confirming their worst suspicions, or just for being dumb enough to get caught.

[Croydon Bob]

The particular concern with this story has to be that it is the work of Mazher Mahmood "The Fake Sheikh".

He has set people up before. He faked the plot to kidnap Posh Spice, trying to encourage some innocent muslims to carry it out and then "exposing" the plot in the News of the Screws even though they weren't interested in anything other than talking about it. He created a fictitious "dirty bomb" story that had three innocent people arrested for terrorism. In both cases the poor bastards he had framed ended up in court before being found not guilty with criticism of the NOTW from the judge.

One of his favourite tricks is to demand illegal drugs from people he is conning. They think they might be able to achieve a massive business deal with a millionaire Sheikh and are sometimes so desperate for the money that they try to arrange a drug transaction, even if it is not something they are normally involved with. The NOTW then runs a story that they are a drug dealer.

His previous activities cast an enormous shadow over this story. I wouldn't be surprised if the cricketers are eventually cleared. If not, it may be a case of entrapment; they may not have done the fixing if not for the NOTW. Or maybe corruption is endemic in Pakistan cricket. I don't know...