Nine ex-captains named in match-fixing report

LONDON - Former India skipper Mohammad Azharuddin faces a life ban from cricket after a shattering report, which named eight other ex-international captains, accused him today of taking money to fix matches.

The report by India's Central Bureau of Investigation, said the nine former skippers, including Brian Lara and Alec Stewart, had been linked with bookmakers in different ways.

South Africa captain Hansie Cronje was sacked last May and handed a life ban last month after admitting match-fixing following a Delhi police investigation.

The ban coincided with an emergency International Cricket Council (ICC) meeting called to address the mounting scandal.

The CBI report's findings hinged on the testimony of a prominent Delhi bookmaker M.K. Gupta who said he had paid several thousand dollars to Cronje to fix matches in the 1996-97 season.

The others named, mostly on Gupta's testimony, included former New Zealand captain Martin Crowe, ex-England captain Stewart, former Pakistan skippers Salim Malik and Asif Iqbal, ex-Sri Lanka captains Arjuna Ranatunga and Aravinda De Silva, West Indies former captain Lara and Australian batsmen Mark Waugh and Dean Jones.

Crowe admitted taking money in exchange for information from a bookmaker he thought was a journalist paying him for a series of articles.

Stewart, one of England's most successful cricketers of recent years, was accused by Gupta of accepting STG5,000 ($A13,600) in exchange for information about pitch, weather and team composition in 1993.

Stewart, currently on tour with England in Pakistan, denied in a statement on Wednesday knowing meeting or taking money from Gupta, Gupta, who told the inquiry both Stewart and Crowe refused to fix matches for him, said he paid $US40,000 ($A76,700) to Lara to underperform in two one-day matches when West Indies toured India in 1994.

The record-breaking batsman, who is en route to Australia with his national side, has yet to answer the allegations.

The CBI report said Gupta had stated that both Ranatunga and de Silva had fixed the Lucknow Test in 1994 between India and Sri Lanka. Ranataunga has denied any dealings with a bookmaker and said he had never been offered a bribe. De Silva has yet to comment.

Most of the players were introduced to the bookmaker by former India all-rounder Manoj Prabakhar, the 162-page CBI report quoted Gupta as saying. According the the bookie, he paid Malik to fix a match in Delhi between the Wills Cup winners of Pakistan and India. The report said Iqbal gave information to a Bombay bookmaker named as Anil Steel. Malik has already been banned for life.

Of the Australians named, Jones said today it was well known he had been approached but had refused to cooperate. The report said Gupta offered Jones $US40,000 to provide him with details of Australian morale, team strategy and pitch conditions, but had been turned down.

Mark Waugh was fined in 1995 by the Australian Cricket Board for giving to a bookmaker information on the pitch. In the report Gupta said he had paid Waugh $US20,000 for details of strategy, team composition, weather and the pitch. Waugh admitted to accepting just $US4,000 and was unavailable for comment today.

The report said serious cricket gambling and criminal activity associated with it had started with India's World Cup triumph in 1983 and risen with the increase in live television coverage in the cricket-mad country.

The report exonerated former captain Kapil Dev who quit as national coach after months of sometimes tearful denials of match-fixing accusations from Prabakhar.

"My mother is happy now and that makes me feel very good," Dev said, but he added: "Nobody can give me back those days when my entire family was traumatised."

But Azharuddin, so recently the darling of the Indian crowds for his stylish batting, was roundly condemned in the report.

"The evidence against Azharuddin...clearly establishes the fact that he took money from bookies/punters to fix cricket matches and also the fact that the underworld had approached him to fix matches for them," the report said.

After the ICC's anti-corruption stand under which they now require players and officials to sign a declaration saying they have never received money for information, Azharuddin is unlikely to be allowed to continue in cricket.

And India's ruling cricket body the BCCI said any action would be taken under its code of conduct which prescribes a life ban for match-fixing.

The CBI report, which roundly criticised Indian cricket's ruling body the BCCI for a lack of action, said no criminal charges could be filed against those named "because of the nebulous position of the law in this regard."

It said "it defied credulity" to believe the BCCI was oblivious to such "rampant match-fixing".

But BCCI honorary secretary Jaywant Lele said he doubted the report's conclusions, adding there might be one or two black sheep but it took 11 players to fix a match.