ICC to investigate allegations of corruption at T10 league:
Abu Dhabi T10 league has been taking place since 2017, in the United Arab Emirates, as the first of its kind 10 over franchise tournament. The league, lately, found itself in news for all the wrong reasons as the International Cricket Council has formally started investigations after receiving more than a dozen allegations about corrupt and suspicious activities during the sixty ball tournament. The Anti-corruption Unit (ACU) of ICC claims that at least six of these allegations are legitimate enough to be investigated.
According to a report by the Daily Mail, the International governing body will probe into these tip-offs which have revealed that approximately £15 million were wagered during the T10 league which lasted for a fortnight.
Some other questionable activities included franchise owners instructing batters and bowlers ahead of the match to play a certain way, big names being dropped without any reason, players scoring at a slow run rate during power play, batters giving away their wickets after playing needless shots and even some players not getting their wages paid. As told by a source to SportsMail, a franchise owner got his son, who has not played even a single first-class match, on the team to open the innings.
”We had reports of strange goings-on in some teams, owners demanding that their son played, owners trying to influence the captain. This looks bad and we tell the owners not to do it, but it’s not covered by the anti-corruption code. The code covers betting on cricket, giving or asking for inside information, not reporting suspicious activity and performing in a certain manner in return for payment.”
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In addition to this, an Indian player is reported to have been paid his salary by the league itself instead of his franchise. Sky Sports getting the broadcasting rights without being charged for it has also raised several eyebrows, as per the news.
The report further read that the bookmakers were seen throughout the tournament in the stands and all the teams were sponsored by the betting companies. The bookmakers, according to a SportsMail correspondent, were seen using multiple phones in the stadiums to relay details down the line and some even told the correspondent how ‘easy’ it is to make money.
ICC investigation usually takes upto a year to be completed owing to extensive inspection of phone and bank records as well as interviews of the people involved. Interestingly, Pakistan players including Mohammad Amir, Iftikhar Ahmed, Azam Khan, Mohammad Hasnain and Ammad Butt were also part of the league this season. However, no claims of these players being involved in corrupt activities have surfaced as yet.
