Satire: ICC announce 'real sheikhs and sellotape' strategy to fight corruption

After Salman Butt and Mohammad Asif were today convicted of spot-fixing following a sting operation by a UK newspaper, a bullish International Cricket Council have promised ‘measures even stronger than the really strong measures we proposed ten years ago‘ adding that this time the ‘strong measures’ would be ‘really, really strong indeed.’Speaking at a press conference, ICC chief executive, Haroon Lorgat, explained how all international matches would now be umpired by ‘real sheikhs’ after the success of the News of the World’s Mazher Mahmood in exposing the spot-fixing scandal, and went on to dismiss accusations his own organisation’s anti-corruption unit had less bite than a bulimic aardvark.

“We grudgingly accept that cricket fans having less faith in the ICC than in a disgraced media outlet which hacks into dead children’s phones is a bit of a problem. By using real sheikhs to umpire matches, we will thus both capture the cheats and recapture the moral high ground by showing that corruption can be rooted out without such mucky fakery. It will also make use of some of the lovely chaps I’ve met out here in Dubai,: he said whilst brushing sand out of his head.

Wide called: One of the ICC’s new batch of umpires in action

The sport’s governing body is also believed to have set aside more than $500 to pay for extra photocopies of its ‘Smell something whiffy? Call us in a jiffy!’ posters, which have appeared in cricket changing rooms across the globe encouraging players to grass up their team mates to a dedicated corruption hotline. An additional $300 has also been earmarked to pay for high quality sellotape to secure the posters, and any nation found to be using blu-tack instead will face severe financial penalties and see their delegates made to room with the associate nation riff raff during annual conference.