Given the events of the last few months, I find myself asking whether there is enough honesty in sport. It’s been turbulent to say the least and few sports can really claim to be completely honest; it ranges from little instances of gamesmanship to full blown unhindered cheating.
We’ve probably all heard about the ‘Bloodgate’ saga that has completely blown Rugby’s image as a wholesome and transparent game out of the water. It has been commonplace to always think that Rugby is what football should be like; no diving and a fantastic amount of respect for the match officials. You would never see huge hulking men go down like that they’ve lost a limb, only for them to jump straight back up. But using a blood pellet to force a substitution? Only for it to not be convincing enough, and resort to actually cutting the inside of a player’s mouth? That’s disgusting, dishonourable and completely disrespectful of the game. The guilty parties have rightly been punished, but the game’s image is in tatters.
Then there is Football, the nations number one sport and rife with gamesmanship. Every week we see players diving and finally it looked like UEFA was about to make a stand with Eduardo’s dive against Celtic. He was charged with a two game ban. Only for Eduardo to appeal and appeal successfully against what we all know was a blatant dive. Another incident involving Arsenal has also shown Football’s ugly underbelly, Emmanuel Adebayor was a walking advert of how to get yourself at least a 3 match ban, a heavy fine and become North London’s public enemy number one. (Well at least at one end of the seven sisters road) His stamp on his former teammate Robin Van Persie would have been GBH outside a football pitch, he caused a minor riot which culminated in a steward been knocked unconscious. Is this what we really want to see at a game of Football?
Whereas diving and potential ‘child poaching’ is still something of a grey area in football, there is no defence for the race fixing that Renault have admitted to at the Singapore Grand Prix 2008. Where the second driver for the team, poor Nelson Piquet Jnr was told before the race that he was to crash his vehicle at a certain point in the race to ensure victory for his team mate Fernando Alonso. Piquet Jnr who feared for his place on Renault team, did as his boss; Flavio Briatore told him. Only for Briatore to axe the driver a few races on. It was Piquet Jnr’s father who brought the incident to light and Piquet Jnr was rightly given immunity from prosecution. A fate that didn’t befall team boss Briatore, who has left Renault as they plead guilty. It is ridiculous to think that the actions of Briatore could land Renault with a substantial ban and in turn lose over 700 people jobs with the motoring giant. A huge price to pay for one race win.
To cheat is to act dishonestly or to gain an underhanded advantage, so where does that leave Caster Samenya? The reigning woman’s 800 metre world champion. However it has been well documented that she may not have been entirely truthful with her gender. While nothing has been confirmed either way, with rumours flowing that she may well be a hermaphrodite. If this is true does this class as cheating? She certainly looks more muscular and broad than her competitors, she has yet to confirm whether or not there is anything she has been hiding. Would she really have been cheating if she is indeed a he?
Its obvious that cheating and dishonesty will never go away in sport, it has always been there. From Maradona’s Hand of God to Dwain Chambers. But is enough being done to really try and clamp down on it? A drugs ban is usually for two years at the most then the athlete can get straight back into action, bans can be appealed and are usually done so successfully or are too lenient. But then how do you stop the inevitable? It seems that in the modern sports world, where money talks, that taking a risk on cheating is a much more viable option than losing.
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