Bookie had approached Shakib Al Hasan ahead of IPL 2018 game between SRH and KXIP; WhatsApp chat details released

The International Cricket Council (ICC) has been banned Bangladesh’s premier all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan for two years from all cricket with one year of that already suspended. This means that the southpaw will miss next year’s T20 World Cup in Australia now. He was banned after accepting three charges of breaching the ICC Anti-Corruption Code.

According to the ICC’s media release, the bookies had approached Shakib Al Hasan thrice in 2018 with once during the IPL in the same year. The all-rounder plays for the Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) in the cash-rich T20 league and he was approached by the bookie ahead of the 26 April 2018 match between SRH and Kings XI Punjab (KXIP).

“Article 2.4.4 – Failure to disclose to the ACU full details of any approaches or invitations he received to engage in Corrupt Conduct – in relation to an IPL 2018 match between Sunrisers Hyderabad v Kings XI Punjab on 26 April 2018,” one of the imposed charges on Shakib read.

Apart from this, Shakib Al Hasan was also approached by the bookie twice during the Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe tri-series in January 2018.

Shakib Al Hasan accepted the sanction

Shakib Al Hasan admitted his mistake of not informing the ICC’s Anti Corruption Unit (ACU) after the bookie contacted him. He will now be free to resume international cricket only on October 29 2020. After being charged, Shakib expressed that he is disappointed to have been banned. But he also admitted that he didn’t perform his duty honestly after being approached.

“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,” Shakib Al Hasan said.

ICC General Manager Alex Marshall also felt that being an experienced cricketer, Shakib should’ve reported each of the three approaches. He also informed that the 32-year-old cooperated fully with the investigation while also admitting the errors he made.

According the released details, Shakib Al Hasan was in contact with a person named Deepak Aggarwal who used to message him on WhatsApp. He asked him for inside information ahead of the 26th April 2018 match between SRH and KXIP. Though Shakib has claimed that he didn’t provide any information, his failure to report the incident has led to ICC imposing charges on him.

Here are more details of that conversation:

On 26 April 2018, he (Shakib) played for the Sunrisers Hyderabad team in its IPL match against Kings XI Punjab.

He received a WhatsApp message from Mr Aggarwal that day asking him whether a particular player was going to be playing in the game that day, i.e. again asking for Inside Information.

Mr Aggarwal continued this conversation with him by talking about bitcoins, dollar accounts and asked him for his dollar account details. During this conversation, he told Mr Aggarwal that he wanted to meet him “first”.

These messages on 26 April 2018 included a number of deleted messages. He confirmed that these deleted messages contained requests from Mr Aggarwal for Inside Information.

He confirmed that he had concerns over Mr Aggarwal, feeling he was a bit “dodgy”, and that, following their conversations, he had the feeling that Mr Aggarwal was a bookie.

He did not report any of the contact and approaches received from Mr Aggarwal on 26 April 2018 to the ACU or any other anti-corruption authority.