Caught in the deep

[Lahore_Real_Estate]

At Penpoint
That Pakistan lost the final and fourth Test against England, was bad enough, for it lost Pakistan the series 3-1, after the Third Test win had raised hopes. But the breaking of the match-fixing scandal showed up the team before the entire world, and made nonsense of the coming one-day international series between the two. The whole affair once again threw into relief the many opportunities for gambling provided by cricket, and not only provided a reminder of the Sharjah gambling which ruined the matches there, but also of the gambling that openly took place in the 18th century in England, in the era of Lord Frederick Beauclerk, son of a duke, clergyman, renowned single-wicket player, MCC President and inveterate gambler. Paradoxically, he was also one of those who took a leading part against match fixing, which was rife in that era also. The ultimate solution was to expel gambling itself from cricket, which happened around that time.
Gambling is supposed to be acceptable, but not match fixing. In the first, teams contend fairly, and the result is not known until the end. But when a match has been fixed, certain players, who have been suborned, agree to play in a way that the other team wins. Those who know in advance who will win have an obvious and unfair advantage over those who don’t, and any gambling between them will be unfair. Those who act as middlemen in these wagers, the bookmakers or more popularly the bookies, would have an obvious advantage if they knew the result. Not only can they learn the result, but also the cash resources at their command mean that they can buy results of their choice. This set the stage for the return of match-fixing to cricket.
Another major factor is that India has been involved in and the Indian populace is addicted to gambling. India has seen itself rise in the cricketing world at precisely the time that gambling has made a comeback. Then there has been the improvement of India, which has come after the decline of the West Indies and the resurgence of Australia, and after a lot of money has come into the game through cable channels via the World Cups. Even apart from the World Cups, cable channels, with their insatiable hunger for sports, needed cricket. Cricket, through its governing body, the ICC, tried to make itself more international, and tried to hurry up the game with the one-dayers and then the 2020s. The abbreviated forms of the game attracted Indians, and Indian gambling syndicates, which soon realised that Pakistani and Indian players were more subject to temptation.