ICC Ban Shakib Al Hasan for Two Years; Details of WhatsApp Chat with Bookie Revealed

Bangladesh all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan has been banned for two years by the International Cricket Council.

ICC confirmed the earlier reports in a statement that the all-rounder has accepted three charges of breaching the ICC Anti-corruption code.

A media release by ICC read: “The International Cricket Council (ICC) has banned Bangladesh captain Shakib Al Hasan from all cricket for two years, with one year of that suspended, after he accepted three charges of breaching the ICC Anti-Corruption Code.”

Shakib was approached thrice- twice during the Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Zimbabawe tri-series in 2018 and once during the Sunrisers Hyderabad match during the IPL in the same year. He was punished for not reporting the activities to the ICC Anti-corruption code as per Article 2.4.4 of ICC.

Shakib Al Hasan said: “I am obviously extremely sad to have been banned from the game I love, but I completely accept my sanction for not reporting the approaches. The ICC ACU is reliant on players to play a central part in the fight against corruption and I didn’t do my duty in this instance.

“Like the majority of players and fans around the world, I want cricket to be a corruption free sport and I am looking forward to working with the ICC ACU team to support their education programme and ensure young players don’t make the same mistake I did.”

The ban is back-dated- meaning Shakib has already served half of the ban and will be away from cricket for another year.

Alex Marshall, ICC General Manager – Integrity said: “Shakib Al Hasan is a highly experienced international cricketer. He has attended many education sessions and knows his obligations under the Code. He should have reported each of these approaches.

“Shakib has accepted his errors and cooperated fully with the investigation. He has offered to assist the Integrity Unit in future education, to help younger players to learn from his mistakes. I am happy to accept this offer.”

Details of investigation released by ICC-

Through the investigation, it was understood that Shakib’s phone number was provided to a bookie named Deepak Agarwal during the Bangaldesh Premier League in 2017.

On 19 January 2018, Shakib received a WhatsApp message from Agarwal congratulating him for being named man of the match in that day’s game, followed by a message saying “do we work in this or I wait till the IPL”.

On 23 January 2018, Shakib received another WhatsApp message from Aggarwal in which the bookie made another approach to him to provide him with Inside Information, saying “Bro anything in this series?”

Shakib accepted that he had begun to get a feeling that the person was a “bookie,” but failed to report any of the attempts made to contact him to the ICC ACU.