Bans handed to three Pakistani cricketers for spot-fixing offences were too lenient, according to a survey of international players released today.
More than three-quarters of respondents to the Federation of International Cricketers’ Associations survey said the five-year bans meted out to Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Aamer were inadequate.
The trio, accused by Britain’s News of the World of conspiring to deliberately bowl no-balls as part of a spot-fixing betting scam last year, were banned by the International Cricket Council, according to The West Australia.
All deny wrongdoing and are appealing against the verdicts at the Swiss-based Court of Arbitration for Sport.
“The vast number of players wants significant penalties to be invoked against those who are found guilty of serious corruption offences,” FICA chief executive Tim May said.
“While 100 per cent of players say they will report any corrupt approaches made to them, 20 per cent of them do not have confidence in the ICC to treat this information confidentially.”
May said the vast majority of the 45 players polled were more comfortable reporting corruption approaches to their team manager than to the ICC Anti-Corruption Unit.
Meanwhile, almost a third of players said they would retire early from international cricket to play exclusively in the Indian Premier League, citing fears over fixture clashes curbing their participation in the money-spinning event.
“The Indian Premier League continues to be popular with the players, and its superior pay structures for the players continue to challenge players’ priority over international cricket,” May said.
“When players are able to earn over 10 times their annual salary from their boards, for just seven weeks’ cricket in the IPL, it would be foolhardy of boards to continue to schedule international matches during IPL, and expect players to remain loyal to the board and international cricket.”
The survey also indicated 54 per cent of players would retire from one or more formats of the game because of too much international cricket.
Players cited the major issues facing the game as governance, corruption and an overkill of international cricket, while only a single-figure percentage said decisions made at ICC board level were in the wider interests of the game.
