Brendan Taylor, the former Zimbabwe captain, shocked the cricketing world when he confessed to have fallen in a trap of match-fixing. The Harare-born Taylor, who had a long playing career for Zimbabwe from 2004 to 2021, said that in October 2019, he had been requested by the businessman to come to India to discuss sponsorships and the potential launch of a T20 tournament in the African country. He said he was told he would be paid US$ 15,000 for the trip.“The timing was such that we hadn’t been paid for 6 months by Zimbabwe cricket (the country’s cricket board) and it was questionable whether Zimbabwe would be able to continue playing in the international arena. So I made the journey,” Taylor stated.At a celebratory dinner with the businessman and his colleagues, Taylor said he was offered cocaine, and he “foolishly took the bait”. The next morning, Taylor claimed he was blackmailed by the same group of men that if he did not spot-fix during international games for them, they would make their video of him taking cocaine public.
Now, Former Indian cricketer Gautam Gambhir reacted to Brendan Taylor’s recent admission.Gambhir mentioned that he was taken aback by Brendan Taylor’s confessions and noted that he has always been against any type of wrong activity. He revealed how his emotions turned upside down after reading the post thrice and later on, went on to be concerned about the freedom with bookies that have been approaching the players.“Brendan Taylor and his admission of delay in reporting a corrupt approach have caught my conscience and attention. I operate on an absolute zero-tolerance approach when it comes to any wrongdoing,”“I was reading Taylor’s statement with the same emotion – disappointment, disgust, and anger. I read it once but it didn’t make me angry. I read it again and it was the same. I read it the third time and the emotions were different. Don’t get me wrong as I am not supporting Taylor.” Gambhir wrote in his column for The Times Of India Gambhir also suggested Taylor should be treated with soft actions if he has proved that he did not fix matches. He worried how the incident would have hit hard on Taylor’s mind as he is a family man now and wanted much more security for the cricketers to report any type of match-fixing approaches without delaying it.“I am only concerned about the circumstances which forced him, a father of four children fearing for his and his family’s lives, to delay reporting the incident to the International Cricket Council Anti-Corruption Unit. Taylor is a sportsperson and not a hard-nosed criminal whose faculties would support him if six individuals barged into his hotel room with a threat to release a video where he was reportedly consuming a banned substance,” Gambhir added. Taylor is the second-highest run-scorer for Zimbabwe in ODIs with 6685 runs in 205 ODIs.
