The Surfer

Between 2000 and now a new animal has taken over the betting business: online betting. Betting websites are fascinating in their operations and in many ways approximate trading in the stock market. The odds for a match are set not by an individual bookie or a consortium of wise men but by the market.

Odds keep changing as a match proceeds. You can bet at various stages of the match and fine-tune your bet given your understanding of the game's trajectory. If your understanding is determined by insider information - as opposed to merely a cricket fan's assessment - there's a fortune waiting.

Was there a genuine public interest in exposing (alleged) sporting corruption?

Cricketers have come from places much smaller than Asif and Amir, from poorer backgrounds, and gone through entire lives – let alone a career – without a scandal to stain them.

If Salman Butt, captain of the Pakistan team, and Mohammad Asif, who is an experienced bowler and no stranger to brushes with authority, are found guilty they must be banned for life, no question. But the jury must remain out on Mohammad Aamer because we don’t know what pressure he was under, if he is indeed guilty, and we don’t know if an alleged deliberate no ball was his first and only offence.

The relationship between board and player was reversed so that players, for long servants, became masters. Television, particularly after the broadcast of that '78- '79 series, helped spread the game beyond any administration's dreams. Talent began to spill in from around the country, away from just Lahore and Karachi that had dominated Pakistan sides till then.

The setting was a classic undercover strategy, specially where an impression needed to be conveyed of opulence and power. In this case, the NOTW team pretended to be members of a betting syndicate (two males accompanied by a female secretary). It was also a classic ruse to flood the scene with pinhole cameras. The presence of three undercover reporters at the table meant that there was a reassuring number of hidden cameras. In any such undercover scenario, the more camera circuitry you have swamping the scene, the more insurance you have. You never know which camera could go kaput on you, and it is always good to bank on the reliability of numbers.

Ironically, at this meeting Majeed abused “Pakistanis” quite a lot, saying something to the effect that he “liked to deal with Indians” instead. He also sat on the table with two phones—one a BlackBerry mobile and the other a downmarket phone wrapped in polythene. He admitted to changing his Sim cards every other week, and he had a ready schedule of the Pakistan cricket team on one of his mobiles which he referred to every now and then.

Teenager Dilip Vengsarkar learned more about batting watching Gavaskar from the other end for Dadar Union than listening to a dozen coaches. Former India opener Madhav Apte, who toured the West Indies in 1953, played 'A' division tournaments for 55 years until the age of 71, facing Mumbai Ranji Trophy bowlers without a helmet.

The solution is simple. Like Australian cricket, make playing domestic cricket mandatory irrespective of the stature of a player. Sadly the stalwarts seem to have forgotten that when they were teenagers they benefited immensely by playing with cricketing icons.

What happens to the three Pakistan cricketers under investigation is another matter. On the face of it, the News of the World appeared to have managed a perfect sting, where the subject Mazhar Majeed seemed able to satisfy that paper of his ability to manipulate events within matches. The no-balls at Lord's, apparently to order, appeared to verify this. However, anyone who has had a cursory look at the 2005 Gambling Act will understand the difficulty in converting allegations into convictions, given the demand for hard evidence that, say, the bowling of such no-balls is directly associated with the sort of criminal gambling activities that are also alleged. There has to be a paper trail.

The tipping point for England seems to have been the comments Ijaz Butt, the chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board, made at 9pm on Wednesday. In an interview with the BBC, Butt was adamant that the three would remain part of the tour, unless they were charged with an offence. Outraged that Pakistan could be such ungrateful guests, after the summer’s mercy mission that brought them Tests against Australia, the ECB’s top brass swung into action.

In Pietersen we have someone whose cricket is almost driven by the internal engine of his ego. No one can match his strut. Underlying it, though, say those who know him best, is an insecurity that ultimately (and uncharacteristically) manifested itself in his soul-bearing interview on Sky last week where he made it plain that his confidence was shot. When the cock of the walk is reduced to that, it really is time to sit up and take notice.
...
As with, say, David Gower, we need to recognise and accept him for what he is while not trying to make him what he is not. The break now will do him nothing but good: an opportunity to take stock. He will be stronger for it. If anyone outscores him this coming Ashes series, then my bet is they will have played exceedingly well to do so.

Emerging at first wicket down in Surrey's chase – greeted by wild cheers and whistles – Pietersen got the chance to exact revenge on Worcestershire's bowlers, which he set about with an array of leg-side flicks in a perky 38 before being caught and bowled by his personal bowling nemesis, the left-arm spinner – on this occasion Shaaiq Choudhry, playing in just only his sixth match. England's selectors, having taken a huge gamble in dropping their star batsman, will be hoping for a similar, albeit more concerted response in the coming weeks.

Perhaps the desire for smallish bans simply stems from a need to see Amir again. The thought that his career is over is far too heartbreaking to even consider. It is his involvement that has made this case so sickening and sad. We tend to reach for hyperbole at times like these, but Amir really is comparable with any 18-year-old bowler in the history of the game. And those who would easily dismiss him as a greedy deviant should recall his overwhelming joy at taking a Lord's five-for on Friday, when he bent down to kiss the turf. The News of the World described it as "a kiss of betrayal", but it wasn't: it was the kiss of a kid who adores the game. He may have done something gravely wrong; if so, we must hope the ICC does not compound it with a hasty and excessive punishment.

The controversy recalls a moment in 1989, when he [Imran Khan] was warned of a plot to corrupt his team. "I was called in the middle of the night," he says. "It was the final of the Australasia Cup against Australia in Sharjah. I was told that four of our main players had either been bought or would throw the match.