Former New Zealand skipper Chris Cairns has received substantial damages from the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) after the club had posted a video with a title implying the player was guilty of match-fixing. The video featured Brendon McCullum's annual MCC Spirit of Cricket Lecture at Lord's, along with the title, "McCullum: On Cairns' Match Fixing." While withdrawing all the allegations against Cairns, the MCC said that the club apologizes to the former all-rounder for wrongly linking him to match-fixing.
The London's famed cricket club further acknowledged that Cairns was successful in a libel case in 2012 when he was wrongly accused of match fixing. It also admitted that the former New Zealand all-rounder was also acquitted by a jury of all charges in 2015, in which he was accused of committing perjury at the 2012 trial.
In addition to paying 20,000 dollars in damages, the MCC has also issued a public apology to Cairns through a video post on the official Lord's YouTube channel. The apology was left up on the channel for an agreed period of 14 days before being removed from the page. Cairns has been linked to match-fixing following statements by Stephen Fleming and McCullum. However, he was cleared of any wrongdoing in a court of law and by the ICC's anti-corruption unit.
