ICC concerned over threat of match-fixing in IPL

The International Cricket Council has concerns over the threat of match-fixing in the Indian Premier League (IPL), ICC general manager Dave Richardson has said.

"We are concerned," Richardson told the Indian news channel NDTV. "Let's face it, the IPL is the first domestic competition to attract such huge interest and, when it does, it's going to inevitably attract the interest of match-fixers and people like that.

"And because of the interest created there is no doubt that we would be concerned if the BCCI neglected that part of the game and didn't make sure that they had very strict measures in place to ensure it doesn't take a foothold in the IPL or any other domestic competition for that matter.

"There is certainly no criticism intended on IPL or the BCCI. It's just a fact of life that there is a lot of betting going on in cricket. And because there's so much money passing hands, inevitably the temptations are going to be there to try and get the players involved.

"And for the first time, a domestic competition is attracting this interest and you've got players who don't necessarily go through the ICC education process. And so you have young players who could be open to temptation or open to being approached by these corrupt people."

The ICC's anti-corruption chief Paul Condon had warned earlier this month that the BCCI-backed IPL posed the biggest threat to cricket's integrity since the match-fixing scandal of the 1990s. "The IPL brings with it the biggest threat of corruption in the game since the days of cricket in Sharjah," he reportedly said at a board meeting of the ICC.

Reacting to Condon's comments, Niranjan Shah, the BCCI secretary, had told PTI: "The Indian Premier League is a huge event with lots of money involved. We are keen to ensure that it remains corruption-free and have taken and will be taking measures to this effect."