Former Australia cricketer escapes jail time despite being guilty of drug deal - Reports

Former Australian leg-spinner Stuart MacGill was reportedly spared of jail time on charges of supplying cocaine on Friday, May 9. A Fox Sports report claimed that the 54-year-old was handed a one-year-and-10-month intensive corrections order by a court in Australia.

Additionally, MacGill will also need to do 495 hours of community service and undergo regular testing. The former leg-spinner was accused of facilitating a cocaine deal between an unnamed dealer and Marino Sotiropoulos, the brother of MacGill's partner, in April 2021.

He was found guilty by a District Court of assisting in setting up and being present at a meeting that took place underneath his Neural Bay restaurant, four years ago.

"His role was essential to bring the parties together and for the transaction to occur. The offender's colossal lapse of judgment has been causative of a very public fall from grace," Judge Nicole Noman said on Friday (via Times of India).

The court's proceedings on Friday also saw MacGill's former Australia captain Steve Waugh react to the charges. The 59-year-old, who was one of the character references tendered by MacGil's legal team, said that he knew his former teammate as a person with varied interests in life.

“Stuart has a wide range of interests including views on politics, world events, sport, as well as an insatiable appetite for knowledge aided by (reading) books on a daily basis. As a captain during this time, I learnt to treat people equally but differently, as their talent, their personalities and circumstances dictated,” Waugh said. (via Yahoo).

Stuart MacGill's international career in numbers

Stuart MacGill played 44 Test matches for Australia between 1998 and 2008 and took 208 wickets at an average of 29.02. He also played three ODIs for his country, the last of which came in January 2000.

MacGill's career coincided with the late Shane Warne and it meant that opportunities for him with the national team were not as frequent as he would have liked. He claimed a total of 774 wickets in first-class cricket and 193 wickets in List A cricket.