Everyone is entitled to an opinion on crime. Wholeindustries are now dedicated to discussing sport andits crimes (though they are not usually calledcrimes). Sports administrators, in particular, askwhy people cheat. Naidoo (2013) speculates aboutsome of the reasons – desire to win, financialreward and Tysonian ‘sport rage’ – but also asks‘What is the role of the sports lawyer?’ From someof the examples given, we might conclude that oneuse for a sports lawyer is to defend ‘cheating’.

Few criminologists would disagree with her conclusionwhere she quotes Duthie's words ‘regulations alonewon't combat cheating’, but many might baulk at thefollowing:

Not many would have the faith she places in ethics and‘sports culture’. Fewer and more rational rulesmight make ‘getting tough’ easier too.

This is not a criminology textbook, but there is aclear need to review existing criminological theoryand relate it to sport. This chapter examinesbroadly mainstream theories of crime before ChapterFive turns to more radical and criticalaccounts.

As we saw in Chapter Two, rules were historically few –beyond the immediate objective of the game – andarbitrarily applied by players with no ‘justice’ toappeal to. But sports and games – be they individualor team sports, video games or even card and boardgames – need rules. Good rules make or break a sportor game and accord with modernist rationality, evenif the emotions aroused by sport and gaming do not.This law making sits well enough with classicistconceptions in criminology, but breaches of themfind explanations reaching back to pre-modern ideasof evil, biology or stereotype, or to would-bescientific positivism – for instance, attempts toexplain Luis Suarez's propensity to biteopponents.

Yar boldly claims that ‘Criminology and allieddisciplines are no strangers when it comes tosport’, but recognises that ‘its study remains arather marginal and somewhat neglected area’ (2014:2-4).