Four South African cricketers banned for match fixing
CAPE TOWN (Reuters) - Four South African crickets, including former test wicketkeeper Thami Tsolekile, have been banned for between seven and 12 years for attempting to fix matches, Cricket South Africa announced on Monday.
Tsolekile received a 12-year ban for "contriving to fix a match or matches" in the 2015 Twenty20 domestic competition, the board said.
Pumelela Matshikwe, Ethy Mbhalati and Jean Symes were also banned after accepting money from ex-international Goolam Bodi, previously banned for 20 years, to manipulate matches.
The development becomes even more disheartening for the South African cricket community after one considers the fact that all four players were relatively experienced in the first-class circuit and each of them had played at least 50 first class cricket matches. While Tsolekile played 3 Tests for South Africa and 160 first class games, Matshikwe, Mbhalati, and Symes played 77, 129 and 62 first class games respectively.
Tsolekile, a wicket-keeper batsman, has scored 5844 first class runs at an average of 38.40 whereas Matshikwe, a right-arm medium pace bowler has picked up 178 wickets from 77 FC matches. Mbhalati, another right-arm medium pacer has accounted for 364 victims from 124 games, and Symes, a batting all-rounder has accumulated 3329 runs and has picked up 68 wickest from 62 FC games.
The remergence of such instances have time and again reminded the cricketing fraternity about the threats of corruption and fixing that loom at large over the gentlemen’s game. These four accused join the infamous list of former South African cricketers such as Hansie Cronje, Herschelle Gibbs, and Henry Williams who were banned at different stages of their careers, for different periods of time for their alleged involvement in scandalous activities both on and off the field.