Any avid cricket follower must have heard about Hansie Cronje. He was a South African Cup captain and one of the best to date. However, his reputation suffered a damaging blow when allegations came up that he was conspiring with a bookmaker to determine the results of a test. The match in question was England versus South Africa. There must have been an element of truth to the allegations because once the story came to light, Cronje resigned. The authorities went on to ban him from cricket for the remainder of his life.
The 2003 World Cup had a lot of controversy because of the venue choice. The match was in Kenya, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. There were concerns about the safety of the players in Kenya and Zimbabwe. England reacted to their concerns by boycotting the matches altogether. England eventually lost their place in the World Cup that year. Kenya was such a bad venue choice for some of the players in the World Cup that New Zealand decided to forfeit the game.
Umpire Darrel Hair, in a match with Pakistan and England in 2006, was convinced that there was ball-tampering in the fourth test. He, however, did not follow the recommended course of action, which would have been to issue a warning. He instead went ahead and awarded England five penalty runs. One can only imagine the resulting fury from the opposing team. Pakistan refused to come back to the field, resulting in game forfeiture.
Pakistan cannot seem to get away from drama. In 2010 three players came under the spotlight with allegations of spot-fixing. The 2009 terror attack led to the death of 8 people when terrorists sprayed the Pakistani team bus with bullets. Some of the players received minor injuries during the attack.
The 2008 Sydney test match brought together Australia and India. Unfortunately, people remember it for the fight between Andrew Symonds and Harbhajan Singh. The Australian accused Harbhajan of racism, resulting in the banning of the latter for three games. An ICC hearing, however, lifted the ban and consequently acquitted Harbhajan of the accusations.
Bob Woolmer was the coach to the Pakistani team in the 2007 World Cup. During the match, the team lost, but there was more bad news to follow. Woolmer came up dead in his hotel room, and there was speculation that his death was due to strangulation. The authorities eventually reported that the cause of his death was a heart attack. But, the truth of the matter has never come to light.
In as much as it is a gentleman's sport, cricket has seen its fair share of scandals, as highlighted in the article above. It, however, continues to maintain its position as one of the most thrilling sports to date.
