A match was played at a ground in Sawara Village, 16 Km from Chandigarh off Punjab State Highways 12 A. This was apparently supposed to be a Sri Lankan T20 match consisting of several players from their country. Sri Lanka all-rounder was part of the match in the squad list published on various online cricket sites. However, Maharoof denied his involvement in any match of this kind which was played in Punjab.
The match was faked to be played at the Badulla Cricket Ground part of the Uva T20 League. But in reality, the match was being played at Sawara Village near Chandigarh. No Sri Lankan players were part of the game and only unknown cricketers from Punjab played while wearing a mask. They also wore coloured number jersey which made it look like a Sri Lankan T20 game.
Shocking scenes in Mohali
“I can categorically assure you that no such tournament was approved or held by our association. We are investigating this matter and are in discussion with Sri Lanka Cricket and other relevant authorities,” said Uva Province Cricket Association (UPCA) assistant secretary Bhagiradhan.
The match was also covered live by Fan code, whose parent company has Dream 11 as one of its brands. The fantasy sports platform Dream 11 is also associated with the Indian Premier League (IPL). The commentary during the game took no names of any players as all of them were from Punjab itself.
“FanCode follows a strict process for shortlisting and screening potential league partnerships for live streaming of matches. Even with this event, we were in touch with the organisers who provided us with the Letter of Sanction from Uva Province Cricket Association along with an email from the official email ID of Sri Lanka Cricket that provided confirmation of the tournament.
After Day 1 of the tournament, where we streamed two matches, the legal team of SLC reached out to us and informed us that the matches are not approved by them and the documents that have been provided to us were probably forged. As soon as we received this intimation, we immediately stopped streaming these matches on our platform,” a spokesperson of Fan code said.
