Sept. 12: The self-confessed fixer Mazhar Majeed was revealing the game’s worst kept secret when he told sting reporters that cricketers lived on a heady cocktail of sex, booze, money and food.
The story of Tiger Woods may be the worst ever case of sporting infidelity. But had each such escapade of cricketers been truthfully revealed, many of the ‘happily married’ ones among cricket’s super stars could have been in the woods too.
Tillakaratne Dilshan’s reported brush with a girl in Zimbabwe did not blow up into a major controversy because there was no complaint from the aggrieved party (if there was one). This brings to the fore the perennial problem of excessive male libido of sportsmen, particularly celebrity cricketers.
The intelligent and discreet ones of previous generations kept their sex lives a closely guarded secret even in days when media used to stay at the same hotels, although the occasional borrowing of the rooms of journalists for romps in days when cricketers doubled up in rooms was not unknown either.
Truth to tell, fun and frolic are not unknown in the high-profile life of Team India. But lips must remain sealed.
Ian Botham’s rendezvous with a certain Miss Barbados in the ’80s became so energetic it led to a broken bed. That made tabloid news but did not register high on the Richter scale in a tolerant society. The sexual exploits of Indian cricketers might make it to a most modern version of Kama Sutra, maybe it would some day if a sting reporter goes for the sex angle.