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These cricketers’ careers abruptly ended due to such malpractices

Cricket is in general regarded as a “Gentlemen’s Game”. However this sport, has unfortunately been at times marred by some of the most dishonest and unfortunate scandals which have brought a lot of humiliation to the honour of the sport.

5 cricketers who got involved in career-ending controversies

In this article, we have tried to list of 5 such cricketers who have marred their own careers with some extremely unfortunate scandals :-

1. Hansie Cronje

Hansie Cronje was regarded as one of the top cricketers for South Africa and also one of their greatest captains. In 2000, when the Delhi Police revealed that they had recorded patchy conversations between Sanjay Chawla and Hansie Cronje, it became one of the biggest match-fixing scandals in cricket history. His involvement with Chawla made him controversial. He initially denied all charges of match-fixing, but later broke down during cross-examination. Cronje ultimately faced a lifetime ban from playing cricket. Additionally, when he passed away in a plane crash in 2002, there were rumours that Cronje had been murdered.

2. Shanthakumaran Nair Sreesanth

S. Sreesanth at one point in time was one of the most popular names in Indian cricket, be it his bowling skills, or his famous World-Cup winning catch against Pakistan in 2007 or his cool dancing moves. One of the biggest match-fixing scandals in cricket is bound to involve a premier league in a nation where cricket is a religion. The Delhi Police brought charges against three Rajasthan Royals cricketers, with Sreesanth being one of them, for their participation in spot-fixing during the sixth season of the Indian Premier League. His cricket career came to a complete halt post this scandal.

3. Mohammad Azharuddin

Mohammad Azharuddin was an outstanding batsman and great captain of the Indian Cricket Team during the 1990s. Sadly however, he was badly involved in the infamous 2000 match fixing scandal. He was implicated to be involved with bookies, which ultimately resulted in him being found guilty by the police of fixing three ODIs. He was then permanently banned by the BCCI and ICC.

4. Tim Paine

Tim Paine was forced to quit as Australia’s Test captain for sending explicit messages, including an unsolicited picture of his genitals, to a former Cricket Tasmania employee. A joint Cricket Australia and Cricket Tasmania investigation was also held, which cleared Paine. However, he was asked to step down from captaincy and ultimately cricket, once the indecent incident became public.

5. Salman Butt

In 2010, a News of the World sting operation exposed Pakistani national cricket team members for accepting bribes from a bookie named Mazhar Majeed in exchange for playing no-balls. Salman Butt, alongwith 2 other players were all found guilty and banned by the International Cricket Council (ICC) for five to ten years. In addition, in 2011, they were charged with conspiracy and deliberately playing no-ball in Test matches, and they were sentenced to 6 to 32 months in prison, thus abruptly ending Butt’s cricketing career.