Spot Fixing

This is the latest scandal to rock the beautiful game of Cricket. Don't know why ICC hasn't been able to weed out this problem once and for all. Even though this is something new compared to Hansie Cronje's days, one needs to get into the psyche of players to comprehend the reasons behind indulging in such deeds. The reason for doing this comes to down to one thing only i.e. Money.

Money has not been a problem since IPL started, we could pardon the past players on this reasoning that they didn't have this avenue to make money. Loads of money is being made by players since T20 came into the mainstream, especially IPL. We all missed one fact that the players who have been alleged in the recent spate of events belong to a country whose players have been barred from the IPL riches and to top it off IPL Nights as well. How can one bear not being a part of IPL Nights !

This ain't any reason to pardon the guilty, but this greed is not only because of the disparity of earnings between cricket and other mainstream sports. Cricket being a sport played my only few countries and having an addictive fan following only in the Indian Subcontinent; which is even now considered a developing region. Come to think of it these guys might be the highest earning sports-persons in their countries and way above their Per Capita Incomes.

The main reason behind players not being apprehensive about indulging in Spot Fixing can be lain on the lax regulatory and reprimanding policies of the ICC and respective country Cricket Boards. Everyone knows that all the players indicted in the earlier cases are still having a great time, they have found better sources to sustain themselves; some have been let off after serving bans of a maximum of 12 months and others have taken gladly to remunerating careers as Sport Commentators, Book Authors or Politicians.

So I feel the change should start from the top, making the ICC more responsible for the sport that it had been mandated to not only preserve but also spread.