Alastair Johnson-Ferguson stared in horror. His hopes of winning the world championship were over - and he could not understand how he had lost. "My conker disintegrated in one hit, and that just doesn't happen," he said, "I'm suspicious of foul play and have expressed my surprise to organisers."¹

His opponent in Sunday's final was 82-year-old David Jakins, who had competed in the championship since 1977 without ever winning it. Yet this time he seemed to win effortlessly. Afterwards he was found to have a fake conker in his pocket, made of steel and painted brown.

Jakins also happened to be the contest's top judge, with the title of King Conker. "The whole thing is nuts," said one conkers fan, David Glew. "It stinks, and needs to be properly investigated to save our game from scandal."²

Cheating is as old as humanity. A Greek drinking cup from around 490BC carries a picture of a wrestler trying to bite his opponent and gouge his eyes. At the Olympic Games in 388BC a boxer called Eupolus was found to have bribed three opponents to let him win.

Dice surviving from the Roman era have been doctored in several ways. Some have been weighted with lead or mercury to make them land on a particular side.

Sport and gambling have continued to be prime areas for cheating. One of the greatest scandals of the Victorian era was the Tranby Croft affair, when a friend of the Prince of Wales called Sir William Gordon-Cumming was accused of cheating at baccaratA card game played at casinos. . At the 1904 Olympics the winner of the marathon, Fred Lorz, was disqualified when it emerged that he covered half the distance by car.

In India, cheating in exams is a particular problem. This summer there has been a wave of arrests of people accused of leaking exam papers, and over two million students have been told their results may not count.³

PlagiarismCopying someone else's work and pretending it is your own. and the use of AIA computer programme that has been designed to think.  have become a major headache. Students are not the only ones under suspicion: Kamala HarrisUS Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden's running mate. If elected, she will be the first female vice president of the USA. has just been accused of copying passages from Wikipedia in a book she wrote.  

Public disgrace has always been society's main weapon against cheating. Eupolus and his opponents were forced to pay for statues of ZeusThe king of the gods, known to the Romans as Jupiter. with a record of their wrongdoing inscribed on the bases. Sir William Gordon-Cumming was dismissed from the Army.

Do we all cheat a little bit?

Yes: We cheat every time we move a golf ball just a few inches out of the rough or borrow someone else's clever phrase or use supermarket puff pastry. It is a sad reflection of our own inadequacy.

No: To cheat is to lose all self-respect. There are plenty of people who recognise that achievements in life mean nothing unless you have succeeded through your own efforts and nothing else.  

Or... There is no such thing as "a little bit" where cheating is concerned. You either play by the rules or you do not - a tiny infringement is just as disgraceful as a major one.

Baccarat - A card game played at casinos.

Plagiarism - Copying someone else's work and pretending it is your own.

AI - A computer programme that has been designed to think. 

Kamala Harris - US Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden's running mate. If elected, she will be the first female vice president of the USA.

Zeus - The king of the gods, known to the Romans as Jupiter.