Fixing trio should be done away with

Former Pakistan captain Ramiz Raja has said that the three cricketers found guilty of spot-fixing should never play for their country again. Pakistan trio Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir were found guilty of conspiracy to cheat and conspiracy to accept corrupt payments. They plotted to deliberately bowl no-balls during the Lord’s Test match against England in August 2010. “I think they should be booted out for good,” Raja was quoted by BBC as saying live. Butt, 27, Asif, 28 and Amir, 19, were charged after a tabloid newspaper alleged they were involved in a plan to bowl deliberate no-balls. A deliberate no-ball here and there may seem harmless enough in the grand scheme of things but the integrity of the cricket played during Pakistan’s tour last summer became increasingly questioned and the reputation of the game was seriously damaged as a result. Butt and Asif have become the first cricketers in court ever to be found guilty in court of on-field corruption but to believe that this particular spot-fixing ring was anything but a speck in a much larger picture is wishful thinking. In February, all three players were banned by the International Cricket Council (ICC) over the affair – Butt for 10 years, with five of them suspended, Asif for seven years, with two suspended, and Amir five years. The trio are in the process of challenging the decision at the Court of Arbitration for Sport. The scandal has further dampened the reputation of Pakistani cricket, which has been embroiled in match-fixing scandals in the past. And with three other players – Kamran Akmal, Umar Akmal, and Wahab Riaz – named in court as allegedly being involved in a betting scam, former England captain Michael Vaughan has suggested a complete overhaul of Pakistan’s playing squad is required. “I guess the only way to clear it would be to completely start afresh with a new set of players because there are still question marks over a few of the other players in their team,” he told BBC Sport.