UPDATED: July, 2010: The number of fake cricket bats being sold on Ebay has risen dramatically. Where once it was just the "English Willow nurtured in India" rubbish being flogged (link to useful guide), I see that unscrupulous UK sellers are now also taking people for a ride.
Every major mass-produced brand of cricket bat (Puma, Slazenger, Kookaburra, etc) is faked. There are many ways to check on the authenticity of a bat but the best way is to simply do a search for high resolution pictures from a reputable cricket website and compare the pictures to the one being sold. If the seller uses library pictures, walk away. The exception would be Powersellers, with multiple listings, who often use stock photos for practical reasons. But you still need to read their feedback just to make sure they sell the real thing.
This cricket season, four people bought what they thought were Grade 1 Puma bats for around 75 each from a UK seller who conned them all into believing it was the genuine article. I reported the seller to Ebay but these things take long to investigate. In the meantime, the conman has started selling his driftwood bats under another user name! I have been playing semi-procricket for about 20 years and am a sports journalist - I have seen and used several genuine Grade 1 Puma bats and the ones in the listings were not one of them. For starters, the stickers on one of the bats were the wrong colour and if you looked closely at the sticker on the front face, it was not aligned correctly (too close to the edge on the left hand side). The stickers on the back were completely different from a genuine Puma bat. Puma would never let a defective bat leave its factory like that, especially not a top of the range model, which is used by its international players, including Andrew Flintoff.
You need to do your homework before bidding on an item. Impulse buys will only end in tears. The winners unfortunately saw deals that were too good to be true (the genuine Grade 1 Puma bat would be closer to 200 or even more) and forked out75 each for a fake made in India that honestly can cost as little as 5 to make (I know, I have friends and family who live in India. A Kasmir Willow fake bat with fake stickers can be manufactured in less than an hour. The real article takes a lot longer). The fake bat will simply crack and even break after a few innings whereas the real deal will last at least a few seasons, if not more if you knock it in correctly and take care of the bat.
Yes, sadly, most cricket bats on the market are copied and often sold to unsuspecting buyers. The only rare exceptions are some bespoke models (Laver
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