Media welcomes jail terms for cricketers

Under front-page headlines such as Plain betrayal and Teammates to inmates, Pakistan media on Friday offered no sympathy to the three international cricketers jailed in Britain for match-fixing.The trios supporters will be barking up the wrong tree, said Islamabad-based daily The News. The truth is that the three players were blinded by greed. In sport, just like in any other sphere of life, there should be no tolerance for cheats and thieves. They belong not on the playing field but in prison.Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir were sentenced to varying jail sentences at a London court on Thursday. They were convicted of conspiring with agent Mazhar Majeed to bowl no-balls at pre-determined times as part of a betting scam during a test match against England last year.That three former Pakistan cricketers, all stars in their own right, will be spending time in jail in a British prison will rankle many a Pakistani, regardless of whether he follows cricket or not, said English language daily the Express Tribune. But one needs to look at this dispassionately and from the point of view of whether justice has been done, and what this unpleasant and unsavoury episode means for cricket.The three players, once the darlings of Pakistan according to The News, had already been handed lengthy bans by the International Cricket Council, all but ending the careers of 27-year-old former captain Butt and 28-year-old Asif.Amir, who was considered one of the worlds best young bowlers, is still only 19 and could make a comeback. He was given a six-month prison term and has been banned for five years by the ICC.