Cricket: We cheated

Disgraced and banned fast bowler, Muhammad Amir has finally seen sense and has confessed to spot fixing during that ill-fated tour of England. Mr Ijaz Butt, the famous Chairman of the PCB, promptly called the English cheats and there was a furore in England over this too. Well, our fantastic ambassador to England joined the fray and caused even more damage, if possible. Pakistan, thus thoroughly disgraced itself at an international forum.

The PCB initially supported the accused trio, Salman Butt, Muhammad Asif and Muhammad Amir. However, they suddenly saw the light and backed off. Perhaps, they considered all the evidence and were told that they were supporting cheating. Nonetheless, they backed off, which  in the end was the most sensible thing to do.

Our famous media, however, has continued to lambast the British, due to their own bigoted approach, and this has gone grossly unchecked.

Well, who then is responsible and who is being punished?

To me, it seems like Asif is the ring leader. However, he adamantly denies any wrong doing. On the other hand, could it be Salman, the idiot of a team captain who just had to make more money? Or is it really our system which doesn’t even ask any of the players that it pays what they are up to or how they afford a life style like they do?

Remember Salman in a Mercedes, Shoaib who couldn’t explain 90,000 Pounds in England, Danish Kaneria’s case in England, the list is endless. But isn’t that the way our leaders also go on? Then again isn’t that why Shoaib Malik is playing or Taufiq Omar or then Imran Farhat?

Has the board ever caught any of the cheaters and punished them? Or does the famous sifarish system work here too? Ejaz Ahmed, who just recently was shown in a wheel chair in a court room trying to defend a bogus cheque has been reprimanded so ferociously by the chairman of the PCB that he has been promoted to the assistant coach of the national team instead of being unceremoniously thrown out from the PCB. I can vouch for the fact that he has cheated others in Sialkot before too. In fact, our players are so concerned by the extra bucks they can make, that they wear and display logos of companies on their clothing despite PCB having a contract with another company, BOOM BOOM! I wonder if they have heard of Adidas, Nike or Reebok? Not even a single cricketer is disciplined for these breaches.

Yes sir, we have cheated the system for some time now and when some of the guys were caught we gave them official sanction and protection. Why do we cheat when we are so talented? Because our system encourages us to cheat. Unfortunately we are doing precious little to stop it. I am asking the media to be responsible and stop emotional reporting and start factual reporting, reporting with a difference; no, reporting to be able to make a difference. Get Asif and Salman Butt in the slammer and get rid of corrupt PCB Officials one by one.