Murali Krishnan in front of a picture of the late Bob Woolmer (Photo: Troels Kaltoft)
In India, the penalty for a player who is involved in match fixing only concerns his sport. He will not be prosecuted for a legal felony. Whereas the fixer risks receiving a fine. None of them will do time in prison.
Murali Krishnan, a journalist for the Indo Asian News service, gave a presentation on match fixing on the last day of the Play the Game conference in Reykjavik, Iceland.
He summarized an alarming history of match fixing within the sport which has resulted in not only unfair results but maybe even murder as well. In March 2007 Bob Woolmer, the head coach for Pakistan, died in his hotel room in Jamaica after his team has lost their opening game to Ireland in the 2007 World Cup. The odds were 80 to 1. The murder investigation was eventually stopped, but according to Murali Krishnan there were evidence, that he died from poisoning and strangulation.
According to Murali Krishnan, who by the way travelled 33 hours to be at the conference in Reykjavik, both match fixers and players make millions while violating the fair play manners which professional sports in general at least publicly are eager to promote and strive for.
Betting is in fact illegal in India, which is the reason why most illegal bookmakers are from India, where cricket is a huge sport. And even though the stories about match fixing has been written in the Indian media, cricket is still very popular.
“The audience was angry when they found that some of their heroes were cheaters. Sponsorship deals fell through. But time is a great healer”, Murali Krishnan states.
He believes that the problem with match fixing is far greater than the same problems within for example tennis.
“Tennis is like a wimper. The problems with match fixing in cricket are much, much bigger“, he says.
And according to him the problem will not stop any time soon. Partly because gamblers can bet on very specific parts of the game, which means that the fixers can make an enormous amount of money just by making an agreement with the team captain.
“It can not be stamped out, but it can be controlled if the bodies act against the players”.
5 responses so far ↓
1 Ivan Mark Radhakrishnan // Nov 2, 2007 at 10:18 am
Match Fixing can be controlled by changing the Qualifying Systems of Sports Competitions.
New concepts mean every official and player around the world will have to be in on the con to fix the World Cup - for example - or even a small part of it.
But ……. which ‘official’ is going to stop their very own gravy train?
When Clubs and Countries are put into 4, 5 or 6 Team ‘qualifying groups’, one (1) fixed match completely alters the outcome of a Competition!
I proposed the Single League Table Qualifying System to FIFA, the Continental Confederations and numerous National Football Associations.
This Format generates Spectator and Television Audience Interest and makes money legally for the Teams, Advertisers, Sponsors etc.
My reward : Three letters from FIFA threatening to sue me and complete silence from the Confederations and Football Associations except one!
2 preet dawar // Nov 14, 2007 at 10:58 am
i thiink the speaker is right. cricket has too much money riding on top of the game - it is high time the administrators do something to stamp out corruption. why is that almost all bookies are indian? there is a bigger story here..
3 Truth // Feb 10, 2008 at 7:12 pm
Match-fixing in cricket is not only confined to Pakistan or a particular country. For example, Indian cricket is equally affected by match-fixing which is why captain Azharuddin had to face the music.
Match-fixing is an infectious disease which could be found anywhere. More efforts are needed at international level to eliminated it.
By the way, final investigations in Bob Woolmer’s case has revealed that he was not murdered or strangulated!!!
4 How to fix a soccer game : jens weinreich // Sep 1, 2008 at 4:31 pm
[…] Game im vergangenen Oktober in Reykjavik einen Workshop mit Declan Hill und dem indischen Kollegen Murali Krishnan […]
5 Анохин // Feb 19, 2010 at 9:44 am
Очень вовремя наткнулся на ваш пост. Появилась одна мысль. Чуть позже поделюсь.
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