It would be regrettable if Marlon Samuels is excluded from the West Indies squad for next month’s Cricket World Cup on account of the allegation that he leaked team information to an Indian bookmaker during the recently concluded ODI series in India.
This is not to say that he not should be required to answer the serious accusation that has been made against him.
The charge, however, should not be allowed to stand in the way of the selection options open to the West Indies who are expected to select their 15 players today.
There are bigger issues at stake here than whether or not Samuels is guilty of any wrongdoing and, yes, the West Indies should focus its attention and its energies on hosting and trying to win the World Cup before the issue of Samuels’s association with the Indian bookie is dealt with, since a major enquiry ahead of the World Cup is bound to impact on the tournament.
It appears that suspicions of match-fixing remain a worrisome issue in international cricket, based on what has been published and perhaps the point has long been passed and the International Cricket Council (ICC) now has to urgently attempt to rid the game of this blight.
In this regard a case may exist for placing more of the onus on host countries and imposing cricket related sanctions in cases where the authorities in those countries are either unwilling or unable to put an end to these match-fixing rackets that ensnare players and bring the game into disrepute. The Samuels matter could not have surfaced at a more discomfiting juncture for the West Indies. Even if the enquiry were put on hold until after the end of the tournament, the allegations could still cast a shadow over the single biggest event of any kind ever to be hosted by the region.
It could also affect the morale of a team that needs all the help it can get if it is to have a chance of winning the World Cup.
In this context one ponders the wisdom of the statement attributed to Samuels’s mother regarding her son’s friendship with Mukesh Kochar.
People are bound to argue – with more than a little justification – that a West Indies test cricketer and an Indian bookie make strange bedfellows indeed and that such a relationship raises puzzling questions about Samuels’s choice of friends, to say the least.
West Indian cricket fans have been quick to claim that Samuels was “set up,” that the “bottom line” in this matter is that there are people who have an interest in ensuring that he does not represent the West Indies in the World Cup.
Without wishing to read too much into this conspiracy theory it has to be said that a less than thorough investigation into the charges against Samuels would be a grave injustice to Caribbean cricket which, as far as we know, has managed to avoid suspicions of dishonest practices.
Indeed, whatever enquiry eventually ensues ought not to be left to the host country only but should involve a team of international investigators that should include WICB representation. Additionally, the terms of reference of an enquiry ought to embrace the broader issue of the relationship between the gambling establishment in India and the persistent allegations of match-fixing that have implicated both Indian players and players from other countries.
This is not the first time that the image of cricket has been sullied by charges of match-fixing and the shaming of two former test captains, Mohammed Azharuddin of India and the late Hansie Cronje of South Africa attests to just how serious the repercussions of match-fixing charges can be. Now that the issue has arisen again the ICC must feel duty-bound to take stronger measures to rid the game of the scourge of corruption. Say what you like about honesty, morality and players’ sense of personal responsibility, it is the easiest thing in the world for young cricketers – young sportsmen, for that matter – to become ensnared by powerful gambling cultures characterized by “slick,” bookies holding forth offers of substantial financial rewards in exchange for easily available “inside” team information.
Of course the players ought to know better but would it not be far wiser to remove the temptation through stricter ICC regulations that protect players from that kind of entrapment rather than to force teams to resort to the altogether distasteful option of instructing hotel staff not to allow players to receive telephone calls?
Something, surely, is desperately wrong when local bookmakers and foreign players are allowed uninhibited communication with each another during the course of a tour in circumstances where such communication would clearly give rise to suspicions of improper practices.
The fact that the Indian police claim to have a recording of a conversation between Samuels and Kochar also raises some deeply disturbing questions to which answers should be sought and given in the course of the enquiry. Has it now become a practice to monitor players’ telephone conversations – selectively or otherwise – or was the monitoring of this particular conversation some sort of “sting” operation directed against Samuels in the face of suspicion that he might have been involved in match-fixing? Unless these issues – including, of course, the legality of monitoring the call in the first place – are raised and answered during the enquiry, its outcome would have been altogether unsatisfactory.
The Indian authorities, it appears, have already set the machinery in motion for its own enquiry and the WICB must get on board with the greatest haste lest the train leaves without it.
There is an important underpinning to Brian Lara’s remark that “we have a World Cup to win” in response to questions from the media about the Samuels affair. It appears that Lara, too, wants the team to focus its attention on winning the World Cup rather than be distracted by high-profile visits to the Caribbean by the Indian investigators which, of course, is bound to distract the team from their preparations.
