“Evil” illegal gamblers using the grooming methods to try and corrupt cricketers have not gone away but the game’s anti-corruption chief Ronnie Flanagan is confident the upcoming World Cup will be clean.
Match and spot-fixing scandals have dogged cricket over the last few years but Flanagan said the authorities in host countries Australia and New Zealand had done everything in their power to ensure the tournament was free of corruption.
“I think it is important that [fans] can come with confidence knowing this will be true competition between teams fought out on ability and perhaps little bit of luck,” he told a news conference on Friday.
“A tournament that is free of corruption or the threat of corruption.”
Flanagan, head of the International Cricket Council’s Anti-Corruption and Security Unit (ACSU), praised the national and state governments in host countries for enacting legislation to criminalise manipulating sporting events.
Education programmes have also been put in place to ensure that every player at the February 14-March 29 tournament is aware of how the illegal gamblers try to exert their influence.
“We know there are rotten people out there, criminal people, who will do all in their power to get at players and others of influence in the game,” Flanagan added.
“They’ll trick them, they’ll coerce them, they’ll try and attract them…they attempt to groom them to get them to do whatever suits their nefarious intentions in terms of illegal betting.
“We have gone to great lengths in a very multi-faceted way to ensure they don’t get their way.”
