Cricket Australia reveal the staggering sums gambled on WBBL
After copping a barrage of criticism for the hefty ban slapped on WBBL player Emily Smith, Cricket Australia has revealed the huge amounts of money that illegal bookmaker rings will wager on every game.
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Cricket Australia has been accused of a potentially career-ending over-reaction in its disciplining of a fringe female player, but has defended its stance by revealing the WBBL has become a gambling extravaganza.
The governing body says more money is wagered on a Women’s Big Bash League fixture than any given NRL or AFL match, with 90 per cent of the interest coming from the subcontinent markets, including from organised crime gangs that set up illegal bookmaker rings.
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Millions of dollars are thrown at almost every women’s match, and for the men’s BBL it’s not uncommon for a single match to exceed $100 million in gambling.
Hobart Hurricanes wicketkeeper Emily Smith was simply making a joke about her lowly position in the batting order when she took a photograph of a classified team list and posted it to her closed Instagram account – but she has been hit with a massive 12-month ban which precludes her from even playing club cricket.
Nine months of the ban has been suspended, but former Australian captain Lisa Sthalekar is adamant the punishment does not fit the crime for a low-profile player who seems like an easy target to throw the book at.
“There were I guess a comedy of errors that happened down there including the fact the match (in question) didn’t actually take place (rained out). Sure, Emily made a mess of it and she won’t ever do it again … but for her, a fringe player, she may never get a contract again, who knows,” said Sthalekar, who is also a players’ association board member.
“I certainly have empathy for her. Cricket Australia are very proud about their anti-corruption policies and how our competitions lead the way, but I think there needs to be a level of understanding and some flexibility in there to understand the impact it has on certain players.
“I think everyone will understand female players are not going to earn their millions of dollars through cricket. It’s not like she’s Meg Lanning or Ellyse Perry.”
The Emily Smith ban is interesting. It’s clear she wasn’t trying to do anything corrupt but also shows how seriously anti-corruption is taken. And it has to be.
— Elizabeth Ammon (@legsidelizzy) November 18, 2019
No... that’s the rules! They have been briefed on this! https://t.co/hfLK9FSmhM
— Dean Jones AM (@ProfDeano) November 18, 2019
Cricket Australia are adamant that the thoroughness of their anti-corruption training leaves no excuses for professional players about their responsibilities.
Smith had an avenue to appeal her 12-month ban but elected to cop the punishment, not wanting to risk further fallout which could potentially impact her hopes of a career after cricket.
Steve Smith and David Warner were at least allowed to play for their clubs during their 12-month bans for ball-tampering, but Smith is prohibited from all levels of the game for three months, which covers the rest of this season.
Sthalekar feels 24-year-old prankster Smith has been “crucified” for one mistake.
“Is the integrity of the game really coming into disrepute by what she did? Is it a dumb thing that she did? Yeah it’s. Should she get fined for it? Potentially miss a couple of games, maybe, but … three months, which means all of WBBL and all of WNCL and I’m not sure if she’s allowed to play club cricket. Surely there’s a better way,” she said.
“ … It has felt like fringe female players (can be easy targets) … there is a human error in this and people do make mistakes and I don’t think we need to crucify them for it.”
THERE CAN BE NO EXCUSES FOR SMITH
Cricket Tasmania chief executive Nick Cummins said despite the fact there was no malicious inent, there were no excuses for Smith, with many bookmakers taking bets on first run-scorer, highest run-scorer, first wicket to fall and so on. Therefore releasing the batting line up prior to a game was a serious breach of CA’s rules.
“Having knowledge ahead of anyone else, that is where the risk is and if you look at the spectrum of what Emily did through to what (convicted Pakistan spot-fixer) Mohammed Amir did, she’s much more at the softer end of it being an innocent mistake,” he said.
“But it has been made very clear to us all along that that is no excuse.”
To put it into context, Smith will miss 11 games through suspension (five WBBL and six WNCL) compared to Collingwood’s Jaidyn Stephenson who was banned for just 10 games after putting three bets on AFL matches he was playing in.
Smith has headed interstate to be with family and friends and Cummins said she was “not great” after the suspension became public on Monday night.
He said CT and the Australian Cricketers’ Association now had Smith’s wellbeing front and centre.
The Victorian-born ‘keeper had returned to the Hurricanes after spending the previous two years playing for the Perth Scorchers.
“This is pretty hard to take so our focus is really around supporting her over the next three months because she can’t play any sort of cricket or train or do anything like that,” Cummins said.
“Isolation is something we have to be mindful of but she’s a strong character and a good person and this was a mistake and we’ll help her get through that and move on.
“Once the sanction has passed it is then about making sure this doesn’t define the individual for the rest of their lives.
“They have done the wrong thing, they know they have done the wrong thing and how do we support them?”
Smith is on a one-year contract, but Cummins said any decision made on her future would be based on her playing performance not this mistake that has resulted in her ban.
Originally published as Cricket Australia reveal the staggering sums gambled on WBBL