TheSportsCampus

The MCC World Cricket committee met in Cape Town on the 8^th and 9^th January 2012.  Kumar Sangakkara, the newest member of the committee, attended the meeting. The most important topic covered at the meeting, because of the dangers it brings to the game overall, was corruption.

The MCC World Cricket committee very much appreciated its contact with Sir Ronnie Flanagan, Chairman of the ACSU, and Tim May, Chairman of the Federation of International Cricketers' Associations. It welcomes Sir Ronnie's account of all the work being done by the ACSU and hopes that the meeting will help to promote links between the ACSU, players and players' associations.

The committee found it helpful to hear from Sir Ronnie about the preventative work that ACSU does and believes it to be important that the ACSU's activities are as widely known as possible in the cricket world.

Led by MCC's Anti-Corruption Working Party, chaired by Steve Waugh, the MCC World Cricket committee has made the following ten recommendations to the ACSU:

1 – Lifetime bans for any captain, vice-captain or coach found guilty of corruption.

2 – Consider the removal of minimum sentences in the ICC's anti-corruption code.

3 – Education materials and punishments at international level should be mirrored at domestic level. These materials should be enhanced, multi-lingual and available in more player-friendly formats.

4 – The ACSU should work closely with players to establish trust and be transparent with its findings to show the cricketing world that its efforts to prevent corruption are working. The committee appreciates that transparency has to be balanced by the requirements of confidentiality.

5 – Young but established players, both international and domestic, and their captains, should be promoted as ambassadors of the Spirit of Cricket and role models who pledge to educate and protect other young players.

6 – Where not already in place, specific anti-corruption clauses should be included in players', officials', coaches' and administrators' contracts.

7 – The committee is keeping an open mind on the use of polygraphs, but for now does not recommend that their use be encouraged except as a possible route by which suspected players might attempt to exonerate themselves.

8 – 'Mystery shopper' operations should be considered, preferably directed at somebody already suspected.

9 – Relevant authorities to explore any unexplained wealth of suspected players and each governing body should hold a gift register for its players.

10 – The ACSU to have an increased capacity and budget to be able to do its job thoroughly, including the analysis of all domestic and international televised matches.

The World Cricket committee will further refine and work on its draft paper to present to the ICC for consideration.

The full list of Committee Members: Mike Brearley (Chairman), Mike Atherton, Geoffrey Boycott, Steve Bucknor, Martin Crowe, Tony Dodemaide, Rahul Dravid, Andy Flower, Mike Gatting, Majid Khan, Anil Kumble, Shaun Pollock, Barry Richards, David Richardson, Kumar Sangakkara, Alec Stewart, Michael Tissera, Courtney Walsh, Steve Waugh