Bangladesh's Shohely Akhter has become the first woman cricketer to be banned by the ICC for corruption. The 36-year-old received a five-year ban after being found guilty of attempting to fix matches during the 2023 T20 World Cup in South Africa.

An off-spinner who played two ODIs and 13 T20Is for Bangladesh, Shohely admitted to breaching five provisions of the ICC Anti-Corruption Code. The charges were linked to corrupt approaches made during the Women's T20 World Cup matches.

Shohely Akhter was not part of the Bangladesh squad for the 2023 T20World Cup and last played for the national team in 2022. She admitted to breaching multiple provisions of the ICC Anti-Corruption Code, including Articles 2.1.1, 2.1.3, 2.1.4, 2.4.4, and 2.4.7, and accepted a five-year ban starting from February 10, 2025.

The ICC’s Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) investigated Shohely’s Facebook Messenger conversation with a cricketer, referred to as 'Player A', on February 14, 2023.

Before Bangladesh’s match against Australia in the Women’s T20 World Cup, Shohely approached her teammate, asking if she would agree to fix future matches. She claimed her 'cousin', who placed bets online, had offered 2 million Bangladesh Takas if she deliberately got out hit wicket during the game.

She further assured her teammate that the amount could be increased if needed and promised complete secrecy, even assuring deleting the messages to erase any evidence. However, the player refused the offer and immediately reported it to the ACU, providing all the voice recordings as evidence, even though Shohely had deleted them from her devices.