Afghanistan Cricket Board bans Shafiqullah for six years

Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) has handed Shafiqullah a six-year ban for breaching anti-corruption code. The wicketkeeper-batsman confessed to the charges levied for the offences during the first edition of the Afghanistan Premier League T20 in 2018 and the 2019 Bangladesh Premier League.

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Shafiqullah was part of the side that went on to clinch the ODI status for Afghanistan and was also a member of two World T20 campaigns. However, the 30-year old has not played an international game since September last year. In total, he has represented his country in 24 ODIs and 46 T20Is between 2009 and 2019. Now he has been banned from all forms of cricket for six years.

The Afghan wicketkeeper-batsman had allegedly broken four articles of the ACB’s anti-corruption code which are – trying to fix the outcome of a domestic match, seeking or offering bribes to fix the outcome of a domestic match, inducing a team-mate to fix a domestic match, and failing to report a corrupt approach.

Sayed Anwar Shah Quraishi, the Afghanistan Cricket Board’s senior anti-corruption manager, said, “This is a very serious offence where a senior national player is involved in the corruption of a high-profile domestic game. The player had also attempted but failed, to get one of his teammates to engage in corruption in another high-profile game during the BPL 2019. It’s an alert for all those players who think their illegal activities concerning the game of cricket will not be disclosed to the ACB’s anti-corruption unit.”

Quraishi also added that Shafiqullah’s admission of guilt and cooperation has helped him avoid a longer ban. The cricketer will be involved with the ACB’s integrity education programmes to help young cricketers.