Australian Cricketers’ Association chief executive Alistair Nicholson has criticised the severity of the ban handed to WBBL player Emily Smith. Cricket Australia imposed a one-year ban on the Hobart Hurricanes wicketkeeper, with nine months suspended, for posting a team line-up on Instagram about an hour before its official release.
In a statement on Monday evening, CA said Smith had accepted the sanction for breaching Article 2.3.2 of the anti-corruption code which prohibits disclosing inside information to any person.
Smith will be unable to participate in any form of cricket for at least three months, ruling the 24-year-old out of the rest of this season’s WBBL and WNCL competitions.
The incident occurred on 2 November with the Hurricanes scheduled to play Sydney Thunder – although the match in Burnie was washed out without a ball being bowled.
“The context is important, it’s really a comedy of errors,” Nicholson told SEN. “Officials are supposed to take away the players’ phones. You had a game here where there was rain-delay, and it was on ice, so the player had their phone when the system shouldn’t have let her have it.
“It’s heavy-handed but the reality is she was a position she shouldn’t have been in. From our point of view, whilst corruption and integrity is very important and Emily has accepted the sanction – it should have been fully suspended.”
Nicholson said the extensive ban has thrown Victoria-born Smith’s life upside down.
“It’s certainly been a real shock for her, it’s a scenario that she wasn’t expecting and she’s basically probably have to move her life back to Victoria. That’s a real change,” he said.
Article 2.3.2 of the code prohibits: “Disclosing inside information to any person (with or without reward) where the participant knew or might reasonably have known that such disclosure might lead to the information being used in relation to betting in relation to any match or event.”
CA head of integrity and security Sean Carroll said Cricket Australia acknowledged that, at the time of posting the team line-up, there was no intent to breach the code. “[However] CA’s rigorous anti-corruption player education program means that players are well aware of their obligations under the anti-corruption code and there is no excuse for breaches regardless of the reasons for information being disclosed,” said Carroll.
“Since the commencement of the WBBL, Cricket Australia has had in place a robust anti-corruption program. We have been working with Emily throughout the process and Emily now understands the mistake she made. Unfortunately, in this instance, Emily’s actions breached the anti-corruption code. We hope this serves as reminder to all that the anti-corruption code is critical to protecting the integrity of the game,” Carroll said.
Smith has played 43 WBBL matches.