Australia captain Mitchell Marsh may face a one-match ban if the Group B table-toppers attempt what Josh Hazlewood indicated in the press conference after comprehensive win over Namibia. Hazlewood suggested that Australia may manipulate the match against Scotland if it means England’s exit from T20 World Cup.
England need to win against Namibia and Oman by big margins to stay alive in the tournament. If Scotland don’t lose to Australia by a big margin, they may have a good chance to qualify for Super 8 stage.
"In this tournament you potentially come up against England at some stage again," Hazlewood said after Australia cemented their place in the Super 8 stage. "They're probably one of the top few teams on their day and we've had some real struggles against them in T20 cricket, so if we can get them out of the tournament that's in our best interest as well as probably everyone else.
"It'll be interesting to see. We've never really been in this position before as a team, I don't think, so whether we have discussions or not, we'll just try and play it again the way we did tonight. That'll be up to [other] people, not me."
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What the law says
Marsh may be charged by match officials under Article 2.11 of the ICC's Code of conduct which says, "inappropriate strategic or tactical reasons… such as when a team deliberately loses a pool match in an ICC Event in order to affect the standings of other teams in that ICC Event."
While the danger of Marsh getting banned may prevent Australia from manipulating the game, they are expected to test their bench strength against Richie Berrington-led side. Hazlewood said that England have a lot to do improve their NRR.
"Whether you get close and you just knock it around and drag it out. There's a few options there but… to take confidence from winning and winning well, I think that's almost more important than potentially trying to knock someone else out. They [England] have still got a lot to do on their behalf as well, so I think it'll become clearer the closer we get to that sort of stuff," the veteran pacer added.
What Waugh-led Australia did in 1999 World Cup
Had the rule not been in place, this is not the first time Australia had plans to manipulate a match to give themselves an edge. Steve Waugh's team did it in 1999 ODI World Cup against West Indies to knock New Zealand out of Super Sixes race.
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