November 17, 2002	Sunday	Ramazan 11, 1423

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Shoaib Akhtar, the blue eyed boy of Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), brought country’s name into disrepute by his act of tampering with the ball against lowly rated Zimbabwe. It is a clear case of cheating whether we like it or not.

When Shoaib was found guilty of ball tampering during the first Test at Harare against Zimbabwe he became Pakistan’s second bowler to be caught cheating.

Unfortunately Pakistan has the dubious distinction of being the only country which has so far produced two bowlers found guilty of wrong doing for which the board must be squarely blamed because both these “cheating” incidents took place during the tenure of the present PCB setup. It seems that we will never learn from our past mistakes.

The other international bowler to be caught cheating was none other than our national team skipper Waqar Younis in Colombo, Sri Lanka. In fact Waqar was the first bowler to be slapped a ban and fined for employing this odious trick.

Luckily for Pakistan the incident happened in Zimbabwe otherwise if the same had occurred in Australia, England or India the foreign media would have had a field day at the expense of Pakistan.

The game of cricket which was known as a gentlemen’s game has become an arena of cheats and crooks who have tainted the very image of the game. Match fixing is nothing new in sports world but the way cricketers have made it their business has crossed all limits.

In this field as well we have not lagged behind though cricketers of almost all cricket playing countries like India, Sri Lanka, South Africa, West Indies and Australia have been known to be involved in match fixing and bribery related scandals.

In the past too, such accusations were levelled against players like Imran Khan, Sarfraz Nawaz and Wasim but they were well contested and the accusers failed to prove the allegations.

Country’s cricket’s ruling body PCB however appears to have taken the incident lightly as the touring team manager, Brig K.M. Nasir praised the efforts of Match Referee Clive Lloyd, former West Indies captain without condemning Shoaib.

The team manager when asked by the media if Shoaib would be subjected to internal disciplinary measures, Nasir said “You do talk to the boys about these things. But he said he regarded the matter as closed”.

The remarks of the team manager was like rubbing salt into the wounds. The brigadier did not know how to handle the media as he lacked diplomacy to deal in such ticklish issues. Being a soldier by profession he only believes in obeying and knows nothing more than ‘Yes Sir’.

The brigadier may have been a high ranking officer but in the sports world he is just nothing more than a dummy. He showed lack of diplomacy and inept handling of the media.

He is not the final authority on the issue and had no business to declare the case closed. The authority lies with the PCB chief Lt Gen Tauqir Zia, and perhaps Brig Nasir is under the impression that since Shoaib is PCB chief’s “favourite player” no action will be taken against him. It is not that easy to compromise on national pride.

Whether PCB chief likes it or not he will have to take some/severe action against Shoaib for bringing international disrepute to the country. Not only that he will have to pull up Brig Nasir, his own nominee, team captain Waqar Younus, and coach Richard Pybus.

The most surprising thing is that the PCB boss has not come out with his views on the issue. For the general there is no easy way out. He has to call Shoaib from the tour straight away and the player should be punished. He cannot be let off by simply reprimanding him.

The PCB boss be may be harbouring some misguided illusions in his mind that Shoaib will win the World Cup for him. If he thinks so he is sadly mistaken.

Bad boys will remain bad boys. Nobody is interested if Shoaib breaks the world record of fastest delivery. It will not improve the image of the country. If at all he does it, it will only improve his personal ego and image.

Nobody in Pakistan will approve of the performance put up by the individual and the collective performance of the team officials. It is a test case for Tauqir. If he fails to act, then the real cause of trouble in the Pakistan team and it’s performance will be crystal clear. The ball is in PCB chief’s court.