Cricket, a gentleman’s game. A game where one can enjoy a summer’s afternoon playing a sport with fellow lovers of the sport with portly wives watching from the pavilion with tea in hand. The game where one can drink pints of lager in between innings and still get away with fielding in the slips. The game where one can enjoy light hearted (or very much heavy hearted as I found this year) tomfoolery with the opposition.


But very much not a game where one may bet obscene amounts of money on one of the great game’s most talented young fast bowlers overstepping the crucial white line.

Young Mohammed Amir, the youngest ever bowler in world cricketing history to reach fifty test wickets, at the tender age of 18. People already comparing him to Wasim Akram, the great left arm Pakistani swing bowler, and how much temperament he has for such a young man, I think about just how young he is, and realise that I’m only two and a half years younger than he is and that if he was English, he may have just done his A levels.

I found myself with mixed emotions this week over whether this young, exciting, refreshing Pakistani paceman should be axed or given a second chance to play the world’s greatest game. As a young pace bowler myself, I admire firsthand what the young man can do, out crafting the world’s greatest batsman with a flick of the wrist and the shine of the ball on the right side, the way he can make the England captain look like a fish out of water. The absolute elation that comes onto his face when he finds the outside edge of Kevin Pietersen’s fluorescent yellow bat, a batsman who has scored over five thousand runs at the pinnacle of international cricket, shown to be floundering against a man twelve years his junior.

So as you can imagine I was very much discontent when these allegations came out into the public spotlight and wondered why this star of the future would possibly get involved in such ridiculous betting scandals stretching far into back rooms of shady apartment blocks on the outskirts of Lahore. Then, the commodity of money came into it and I shook my head and sighed: money conquers all in the end.

I find myself in despair over whether he should be banned for life for shaming the sport, or whether the ICC will show sympathy and recognise the pure talent that this young man has, it would be a tragic loss to the game to see a talent this early go so quickly. But perhaps he should go? If he was given a cash incentive to overstep the white line then in my opinion he has to go, if one has the arrogance to shame one’s country in the way that he did (if he was bribed) then he should be handed a life ban. Under any other circumstances perhaps a lighter view should be taken.

There a number of other scenarios that could have taken place:

1) The Captain’s Role – As a cricket captain myself, I ask players to do what I say with the minimum of fuss and accept a decision that they perhaps aren’t entirely happy with, it’ll be repaid in due course I promise them. Now, if Pakistani captain Salman Butt asked him specifically to bowl a no ball, then perhaps young Amir thought it was another tactic, and not a notorious betting scandal, I know I listen to my senior captain, and don’t dare to question his authority, this may have been the case.

2) The Dressing Room – Equally similar to the captain’s role, if there’s sustained pressure from the coach, backroom staff, and other players, then it would have been very hard for the young man to do anything about it. He wouldn’t have turned a blind eye, and would probably have backed down into doing it, but still a dire misjudgement.

3) A Threat – Perhaps an unlikely scenario, but if the betting thugs had his parents or siblings locked up until he overstepped, then I reckon he would have done most things to make sure they were safe. Who wouldn’t?

4) Money – Or does he simply want more money on top of his match fee? And sponsorships. And endorsements.



I leave this one open so one may form their own opinion.