Famous cases of cheating in sport

Reuters

CHEATS GALLERY: Famous sporting cheats (clockwise from top left): Cricketer Hansie Cronje, ice skater Tonya Harding, sprinter Ben Johnson and cyclist Floyd Landis.

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Here are some famous cases of cheating in sport:

CHICAGO WHITE SOX - After the heavily favoured Chicago White Sox lost the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds, eight players were charged with being paid by gamblers to throw the championship. The scandal led to the creation of the autonomous post of commissioner of baseball, who banned the players for life including the famous Shoeless Joe Jackson.

BORIS ONISHCHENKO - Russian pentathlete Boris Onishchenko was sent home in disgrace from the 1976 Montreal Olympics. The Soviet Army Major was disqualified for hiding an electrical switch in his fencing sword which awarded him points when he had not in fact scored.

DIEGO MARADONA - Argentina won a 1986 World Cup football quarterfinal against England in Mexico 2-1, Maradona scoring the first with his hand, the infamous 'Hand of God' goal.

BEN JOHNSON - The Canadian sprinter made headlines for his world-record 100 metres victory at the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games. After the race, however, he tested positive for the banned steroid stanozolol and was stripped of his gold medal.

TONYA HARDING - American Harding was banned for life from ice skating for trying to cover up a 1994 incident in which her husband and an associate deliberately injured her rival Nancy Kerrigan.

HANSIE CRONJE - Former South Africa captain Cronje stunned the cricket world in 2000 after admitting he had accepted about $130,000 from bookmakers to influence the course of matches. He was subsequently banned for life. Cronje died in a plane crash in 2002 aged just 32.

PARALYMPICS - In 2000 Spain's Paralympic basketball team were ordered to hand back gold medals won at the Sydney Games after 10 of their players were found to have no disability.

FLOYD LANDIS - The American cyclist became the first Tour de France winner to fail a drugs test during the race after testing positive for the male sex hormone testosterone. Landis, who denied using performance-enhancing drugs, was stripped of the title he won in 2006 and given a two-year ban which ended in 2009.

HARLEQUINS - Dean Richards resigned as director of rugby at English club Harlequins and was suspended from world rugby for three years for his role in a fake blood injury to winger Tom Williams during a 2009 Heineken Cup game against Leinster.

PETE ROSE - Rose, baseball's record-holder for hits, games played and at-bats accepted a lifetime ban in 1989 when, as manager of the Cincinnati Reds, he was accused of gambling on games in which his team was playing. He denied betting on baseball games for the next 15 years, then admitted doing so in his 2004 autobiography "My Prison Without Bars."

- Reuters