Isabelle Westbury is a freelance journalist who writes for the SII. Her focus is on politics and sport, especially cricket. She has written for a number of publications including The Guardian, The Times, The Independent, The Daily Mail and The Sun, and broadcasts on cricket for the BBC. She has an undergraduate degree from Oxford University, where she was President of the Oxford Union, as well as a postgraduate degree in law. She is also Middlesex CCC women’s cricket captain.
All posts by Isabelle Westbury
Horse racing betting bans • The four men convicted of breaching the British Horseracing Authority (BHA)’s Rules of Racing last month have received bans of between six months and eight years. Towcester racecourse chief executive Kevin Ackerman and jockey Michael Stainton are to appeal, having been disqualified from racing for six months and...
The Istanbul 13th High Criminal Court reportedly issued a unanimous ruling on Friday (9 October), acquitting a number of the high profile suspects among the 35 defendants accused of match-fixing in an ongoing investigation. The exact number acquitted is unclear. According to local news sources, amongst those acquitted include the...
The International Cricket Council (ICC) has reportedly launched a match-fixing probe against a high ranking Sri Lanka Cricket official. According to the AFP, Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) has said that Jayananda Warnaweera, curator of the Galle International Stadium, is under investigation by the ICC’s anti corruption unit. SLC, the...
The Italian professional tennis player Daniele Bracciali and his occasional doubles partner Potito Starace have had their life bans from tennis overturned. The Federal Court of Appeal of the Federazione Italiana Tennis (FIT) renounced Starace’s ban completely, and reduced Bracciali’s life ban to a 12-month suspension. In February the FIT...
A Russian court has reportedly thrown out two lawsuits against German TV channel ARD after it published a series of damning documentaries alleging widespread doping in Russian athletics. According to the Associated Press, the two lawsuits were filed separately by Valentin Balakhnichev and the Russian Athletics Federation (VLFA). Valentin...
Jamaican athletes Asafa Powell and Sherone Simpson have reached an out-of-court settlement with nutrition company Dynamic Life Nutrition LLC. Powell and Simpson both reportedly sued the nutrition company earlier this year after it was found that their positive tests for the banned stimulant oxilofrine were as a result of...
Detective Chief Superintendent, Chair of the Darts Regulation Authority (DRA), Vice Chairman of the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA), Special Member of Sport Resolutions UK’s Panel of Arbitrators. Nigel Mawer’s past and current accolades are a mouthful in themselves. Now retired from the police, Mawer, a one-man...
On Thursday evening, US Anti-Doping Agency’s (USADA) issued a statement on ‘Inaccurate News Reports Regarding the Sport of Pro Boxing’ in response to a number of media articles suggesting that the professional boxer Floyd Mayweather violated USADA’s rules ‘by receiving an IV infusion of saline and vitamins.’ Mayweather subsequently issued the following statement...
Jake Livermore, the Hull City midfielder, will not be banned from football after testing positive for cocaine. The 25-year-old professional footballer was suspended by the Football Association (FA) and his club, who play in the FA Premier League, following a positive drugs test in May. However following a disciplinary...
The British Horseracing Authority (BHA) have found four of five people charged earlier this year with breaching the BHA’s Rules of Racing to be guilty. David Greenwood and Kenneth Mackay, former and current horse owners respectively, jockey Michael Stainton and Kevin Ackerman, the chief executive of Towcester racecourse, were...
• Jeffrey Webb has been allowed by a US District Court in New York to return from New York to his home in Georgia while the case against him is being heard, reports Inside World Football. Webb pleaded not guilty to corruption charges in July after he was named...
• Delhi police have appealed to the Delhi High Court following the dropping of spot-fixing charges by a New Delhi trial court earlier this year, as reported at the time by the Sports Integrity Initiative. On 25 July, the trial court discharged 36 of the 42 accused, including cricketers...
Local media have reported that both the coach of Berekum Chelsea and that of Accra Hearts of Oak have refuted claims that the recent football match between the two sides over the weekend was fixed. Hearts of Oak played Chelsea in a First Capital Plus Premier League fixture, the...
The Belgian Federal Prosecutor’s Office is investigating alleged corruption within professional tennis matches across the world, reported Belgian financial newspaper De Tijd. According to the paper, the Federal Prosecutor has knowledge of hundreds of suspicious bets placed from Belgium on various matches. As reported by the Sports Integrity Initiative earlier this...
Former South Africa rugby union player Chiliboy Ralepelle has been suspended for two years after testing positive for an anabolic steroid. In a statement on its website World Rugby, the world governing body for rugby union, said that the 28-year-old had failed an out-of-competition doping test over a year...
