Speed threatened to sack Mark Waugh

Malcolm Speed, the former Australian Cricket Board chief executive, asked the opinions of two influential legal entities prior to threatening to drop Mark Waugh from the national side. Speed, who is now the ICC chief executive, said yesterday that he requested the ACB to deny Waugh a place in the side after the latter refused to speak to anti-corruption officials in 2001.

"I did not want the lead story the following day to be that the player - who was advised by a leading QC [Queen's Counsel] - had obtained an injunction against us," Speed said in The Age. "Not surprisingly, we decided to obtain a second and very favourable opinion from Melbourne's leading Queen's Counsel."

Leo Karis, Waugh's manager, said that when the incident occurred Waugh did seek legal advice from his lawyers in regards to the nature of the inquiry and the intent of Speed's comments. "It was not that he did not want to participate - he wanted more information," Karis said in The Age. "I must say I thought it was a disgusting tactic by the ACB because he was a player who was taking his legal rights but was being judged - what happened to being innocent before being found guilty?"

Waugh was found guilty of supplying weather and pitch information to Mukesh Gupta, an Indian bookmaker, in 1993 and was fined US$10,000 in 1995 by the ACB. The ACB threatened to drop Waugh from the team when he initially refused to speak to anti-corruption officials in 2001, but Waugh agreed to cooperate.

Speaking on the challenge of fighting corruption, Speed said cricket was on top of its fight. "We take great heart from our battle against corruption. Five years ago, cricket was on its knees as a result of corruption scandals. If we had a share price, it would have hit rock bottom." Speed was speaking at the annual conference of the Australian and New Zealand Sports Law Association in Sydney.