By Sukuoluhle Ndlovu
The International Cricket Council has said it will not lay any charges on its five members who were exposed in an Al Jazeera documentary, Cricket Match Fixers that aired on the 27th of May 2018.
All five have been interviewed by the ICC Integrity Unit and there was no evidence enough to lay charges.
ICC engaged four independent betting and cricketing specialists to analyse the claims. All the four concluded that the passage of play identified in the programme as being allegedly fixed were entirely predictable, and therefore implausible as a fix.
The investigation had its focus on three main areas; the claims that were made by the program, the suspects who were part of it and how the programme gathered evidence.
The programme alleged that two matches were fixed; India v England in Chennai 2016 and India v Australia in Ranchi in 2017.
The ICC General Manager Alex Marshall said claims made in the documentary lacked credibility.
“We welcome the reporting of alleged corrupt activity within cricket as there is no place for such in our sport, but we also need to be satisfied there is sufficient evidence to sustain charges against participants.
“In the case of the claims aired in this programme, there are fundamental weaknesses in each of the areas we have investigated that make the claims unlikely and lacking in credibility a viewpoint that has been corroborated by four independent experts.
“On the basis of the programme, the Participants to the Code who were filmed appear to have behaved in a questionable manner; however we have been unable to assess the full context of the conversations that took place beyond what was seen versus what the Participants claim actually happened. This combined with the absence of any other credible evidence means there are sufficient ground to bring charges under the ICC Anti- Corruption Code.
“Should any new substantial evidence come to light I will re –examine the case. But at present l am comfortable with the conclusion of the investigation and the thoroughness with which it will was undertaken,” he said.
