Line & Length

Is there a suggestion of a ‘ Holier than thou’ attitude to be seen in Graeme Swann’s belief that cricket cheat Mohammas Amir’s return to the hallowed turf of Lord’s sickens him? “This is a man who crushed the morality of the game. And yet he is being allowed back to play at the home of cricket,” Swann says. Perhaps, there is place for the point of view that the disgraced Pakistan fast bowler has not paid the consequences for his part in the corruption scandal involving spotfixing. But not to accept the ruling of law and move on with the game is to be somewhat hoity- toity.

Cricket lost its morality long ago, perhaps soon after its birth when it became the most popular medium for wagers. The game that seemed to become a metaphor for fair play came as it evolved. To believe cricket could ever survive in its so- called innocent form was always a pipedream. In the most modern era, the game was brought down from its moral high horse in a series in India in which a gentleman named Bagri was betting on the outcome of the toss and was influential enough to fix the outcome through certain players.

Once in, that kind of corruption of matches at the highest level was bound to eat away at the vitals. No one believes the influence of the corrosive illegal betting market is any less now, even after all the hullaballoo over the top levels of Team India having come under the influence of high rollers and bookies from the world of gambling. The IPL probably made matters considerably worse with many a nouveau multimillionaire of the game still indulging in questionable match and spot- fixing practices. The sheer shock value of rich sportsmen indulging in something as low as fixing should have alerted the authorities to doing something about it. Also, this was not Indian cricket’s first great cricketing scandal.

The ostrich in the sand act was, however, the perfect