Cricket's loss could be other sports' gain

By S. Thyagarajan

HANSIE CRONJE. No star in contemporary cricket, or of any era, comes out as such a complex, confused, and, agruably, charismatic, personality. Is he a villain, a hero, or an innocent victim of circumstances ? Perhaps, an amalgam of all. The sentiments in various fora, since the day the South African captain confessed that he did not play the game straight, underscore that.

The outrage over the allegations of match fixing is charting itself through a predictable course. Everyone who responds catches the attention. Reports are resurrected and statements repeated, recalled with new interpretations and conclusions. The polemical exchanges of celebrities, former players, administrators and present stars make a good copy for anyone to sit in judgment on l'affaire Cronje.

The Aussie skipper, Steve Waugh, refused to believe that Cronje was caught napping by the Delhi Police, advocating at the same time to punish those found guilty. He termed those fixing matches do not play for the supporters, but, consciously, cheat them. Many in the Australian media share this perception. But beneath this moral high taken by experts and ex-players-at least outside this country-is that the disgusting innovation of match fixing and betting is a sub-continental idea which has corrupted every layer of cricket. The two Aussies involved in the controversy, Mark Waugh and Shane Warne, were lured by an Indian bookmaker. The alleged links of Hanje Cronje involve again, Indian bookies. An unofficial estimate in the Australian media puts the figure of illegal betting in the sub-continent at A$ six billion.

Hansie Cronje, who probably is the best symbol of Christian orthodoxy of confessing guilt to a priest, has certainly answered his conscience; but, inevitably, injected an element of guilt in every practising cricketer at the highest level. An Australian cartoonist portrayed W.G. Grace on the one side caricaturing Cronje at the other end with a caption, ``disgrace.'' Cronje's confession and the consequent sacking sparked off a debate, some even sympathetic to the South African. Letters in leading newspapers at Sydney and Perth condemned the Australian Cricket Board for taking a lenient view of imposing pittance as fine on Mark Waugh and Warne and then elevating them to a higher status; most writers appreciate United Cricket Board of South Africa's decision to sack a star of the first magnitude.

Amusing is the turbulence on cricket administration and players here. Clearly, the Board is on the defensive, reframes the Code of Conduct and takes cover under Chandrachud's probe. But a lot of dirty linen is washed in public with the former President coming up with startling revelations. Names of present and past stars are freely discussed as having had possible links with bookies. Rumour and speculation rule the day.

Cronje stands accused as a disgrace to cricket, an obsession interpreted as national sport here. For non-cricketers who seek glory by sheer hardwork, sweating it out day and night without recognition, rewards and appreciation, Cronje is a Messiah, revealing the seamy side of cricket, one day variety at that. Lakhs of Indians must be wondering today whether they were taken for a jolly ride during those innumerable matches of one- day variety not knowing whether the results are achieved or faked; whether the records clobbered were true or fixed. Commentators, doubling up for Cardus, Glascow or Fingleton, pontificating and purveying superlatives, stand exposed not knowing, which among the finishes were contrived, whether their eloquence was justified or not.

The embarrassed lot includes sponsors, whose uninhibited offer to stay in the limelight sharply reflects the ruination of sport by excessive commercialism paving the way for crooks and cronies to thrive as middlemen and siphon off funds into the pockets of anti-national and anti-Indian elements. The game could still have been protected from the pernicious influence of fixers and bookies, if the administrators refrained from sanctioning tournaments all through the year in the name of globalisation in areas where cricket will never, never make an impact. The guiding factor was to enrich the coffers. In the process the administrators lost the battle to encroachers, including the sponsors, who, it is believed, began openly interfering in selections. Their credibility has taken a severe dent.

Cautious though the approach of BCCI is to the unfolding drama of Hansie Cronje and the ramifications in almost all cricket-playing countries suggests a note of anxiety and damage control. But the way the issue is getting snowballed at this point makes one wonder what the end game will be.

There is a growing consensus now to put a moratorium on one day cricket to minimise the evil of betting and match fixing. The proposed ICC meeting should not feel shy of discussing such a line if it is keen to save cricket, from the clutches of middlemen whose tribe, it appears, keeps enlarging.

l'affaire Cronje should open the eyes of the public and sponsors in India that sport is not merely cricket, now corrupted and lacking in character, but in other areas as well where men and women show extraordinary strength, skill, hardwork and spontaneity. Cronje probably has destroyed the romance and sanctity associated with cricket, but in a negative and perverse sense, has set the tone for Indians to think about virtues in other sport. Is this not a good augury in the Olympic year?

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