Silence rents the air but for how long?

"Raids on top cricketers and officials" screamed the banner headlines. We are assured that the investigation has reached a critical turn. Obviously the most compelling priority for the game today is to clean up the accumulated filth. To ferret out the rotten apples and allow cricket to bask once again in all its pristine splendour. But how much does this sudden frenzy of activity really change things? Are we indeed any closer to the climax of this sordid affair is a point we should take time off to ponder.

The authorities have it that they need two months to put their nose into the pile of seized documents and sniff some malodorous goings-on. Assuming they are able to frame charges at the end of it, what is it going to be for? If the maximum they can do is charge the players with tax evasion, it would be akin to charging a murderer with jumping a traffic signal. Ever since the scandal broke in April, the players have been taut with apprehension of the likelihood of a storming of their hideouts. And have adequately covered their tracks, I daresay. We shall see in due course. The point is that there's still a long way to go before any of the players can be convicted of match fixing. Till then they have to live through the torture of not knowing what their fate is going to be in the end. Is it worth it?

Those involved seem to have little remorse for what they have done. Well, maybe they do but are simply too scared to admit to it. It may be too monstrous a step to contemplate. The choice however is before them: to harbour a mind ridden with guilt or to exorcise it in one fell swoop. By coming clean and baring their soul.

The murmurings of discontent among the once admiring public have been growing stronger for the last two months. Obviously the players are trusting in the strategy of attrition. Just waiting for the fire to die down. Public memory is short and all that sort of thing. But they would be fooling themselves. The price of their stubborn denials from the roof tops is going to be heavy. If the whole affair remains in limbo like this, far from forgetting, the feelings against them will harden over time. "Yeah he could hold a bat but...". That qualifier will always dangle from people's lips.

On the contrary, if they come clean they have the chance to be forgiven, not all at once, but definitely so. "All faults can be forgiven of him who has perfect candour" wrote Walt Whitman some 120 years ago and it is still true today. Sure they will be made to receive some just desserts but the public will eventually veer in their favour as it indeed has in the case of Hansie Cronje. Admittedly, for a player to change his habits after years of training in falsehood and deception is going to be hard. There is the consolation though that unlike Cronje they will merely be saying what the public already believe, so the shock will be that much less.

Now it might be said that any crook will trust his chances of eluding the dragnet and live with the loss of face among the public. Rather than handing himself in and spending time in the clink in an attempt to seek forgiveness from the fans and make peace with his conscience. But if they don't take the plunge now, chances are they won't have that choice for much longer. The option of volunteering their guilt will be void if the detectives snapping at their heels succeed in prising open their dark, deep secrets from the voluminous evidence that has been procured. Then there will be both insult and injury. The doors of grace will be shut and barred.

Of course the confessors will have to go through hell like Cronje did. But they will be back. 'To Hell and Back' was a book written by motor racing legend Niki Lauda after a horrific crash in which he was given up for dead and a priest was ready to perform his last rites. That title would be just as appropriate if Hansie Cronje were to write his memoirs. The French have a saying: 'Tout comprendre, tout pardonner' (To understand all is to forgive all). That perhaps best expresses the psychology of the public and the accused can do worse than to remember it.