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A Tragic Hero

Is Hansie Cronje a villain or a hero? Is he a shameless crook or a great cricketer with a fatal flaw? Has he destroyed the game by his greed or cleansed it by confessing to the truth? Maybe it is time to think this one through.

Wherever I go I hear the same tedious arguments against Cronje. How he has finished off what was once a gentleman's game. How he must be brought back to India and tried. How he must face exemplary punishment so that all players in future think twice before getting embroiled with bookies trying to fix the game. But before we pass judgement on Cronje, let us look at the facts dispassionately.

One: Hansie Cronje did succumb to greed and he initially lied to cover it up. His motives for the cover-up could be any of four. One: He thought he could still get away with it. Two: He was genuinely ashamed of himself for having been so stupid. Three: He was trying to save his team mates and other players involved in match fixing in the belief that one ruined career is more than enough to teach everyone a lesson. Four: He was scared of exposing the powerful and wicked people behind the betting syndicates. Of these, only the first reason is villainous. We can easily forgive him for the rest.

The way he implicated Azhar and then, the very next day, let him off the hook speaks volumes for the fear and tentativeness that drives the man. It is not the sign of a crook. It is the sign of an essentially decent man who knows that he is in deep shit but is still trying to save everyone else.

Two: While he did initially lie, Cronje was uncomfortable with falsehood and quickly confessed to the crime. As any policeman will tell you, this is not the sign of a hardened criminal. Only a novice admits his crime almost immediately after denying it. No third degree was applied to him, as so often happens here to assist confessions. He confessed on his own after grappling with his guilt for a few hours. He called up his parish priest and then went out and sang. He sang like a canary only to realise after a few hours that he was not only destroying his own career but also hurting others.

That is when he became more circumspect and what the media sees as his waffling and perfidy is actually the tortuous soul searching of a decent man trying to cope with his own guilt and at the same time ensure that no one else gets hurt for his sake. He not only tried to bail out his own team mates but also threw Azhar a lifeline by saying that it was possible that Azhar had no clue as to what MK offered him.

Three: Cronje's confessions will go a long way towards finding out the truth behind all these match fixing allegations. He is the first cricketer to admit to the crime. The rest are all hiding behind a thick wall of sullen silence, praying that the crisis will go away. That public memory, proverbially short, will forget this whole sordid episode in a few months and they can then return to living their lives as they have always done. In the glare of adulation and easy cash.

They are not sorry about what they did and, unlike Cronje, they are not even ready to confess. They are, as the Chinese proverb says, bending their heads and letting the storm blow by. In the belief that nothing stays in the headlines forever. Not even treachery to the nations they have represented on the playing fields of the world.

At least Hansie Cronje confessed to his crime and is ready to take the rap for it. This is not only the sign of a decent man. It is the sign of a good cricketer and a great team leader which Cronje undoubtedly was. That is why I hope history eventually remembers him not just as a fine batsman who was discredited for his indiscretions but also as a brave person who, in a moment of dark personal crisis, chose not to stick to lies and half truths but came out openly and cleansed the game. In the process, he lost virtually everything that he had built up over a career spanning two of the most competitive decades of the game but he nevertheless had the courage of his convictions. He did not pass the buck. He tried not to implicate others. He walked into the dark hole of pain and anguish all by himself.

It was not an easy thing to do. To shoulder the entire burden of guilt and responsibility so that others may go free. But that is exactly what you expect a great captain to do and Hansie Cronje, whatever his faults may be, is undoubtedly one of the greatest captains cricket has ever seen. This is what he has proved even in his disgrace. May be it is now time to stop knocking him and start cleansing the game of its actual manipulators, most of whom unfortunately live in this subcontinent and are still walking about with their heads held high.

Pritish Nandy

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