SOCCER-MATCH-FIXING Match-fixing is growing and penetrating deeper into soccer says Federbet

Record ID: 149866

  • Title: SOCCER-MATCH-FIXING Match-fixing is growing and penetrating deeper into soccer says Federbet
  • Date: 2nd June 2015
  • Summary: BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (JUNE 2, 2015)(REUTERS) EXTERIOR OF EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT EU FLAGS FLOATING INSIDE, FILE ENTITLED 'ANNUAL FIXED MATCHES, REPORT 2015' BY ANTI MATCH-FIXING ORGANISATION FEDERBET AND FEDERBET GENERAL SECRETARY FRANCESCO BARANCA WALKING JOURNALISTS AT BRIEFING ORGANISED BY THE EUROPEAN SOCIALIST PARTY AND MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT MARC TARABELLA TARABELLA AND BARAN
  • Embargoed: 17th June 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Belgium
  • Country: Belgium
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA6GIS296VC8NLKY2ZX1UM74Y4X
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Fed up with corruption in soccer, the European Socialist Party in the European Parliament invited anti-match-fixing organisation Federbet to present the results of its 2015 report on Tuesday (June 2).
    Federbet said it investigated when betting took place and they noticed "something that goes against mathematics" or suspicious financial flux. The information will be passed on to the police authorities of countries where match-fixing is suspected, Federbet Secretary General Francesco Baranca said.
    About fifty games in the 2014-2015 season are suspected to have been rigged, European Parliament member Marc Tarabella, from the European Socialist Party, said. He said Italian, German, Belgian, Spanish, Greek, Portuguese, Croat, Latvian, Romanian, Slovenian and Ukrainian teams are concerned. Europa League preliminary games are under scrutiny too.
    Baranca said possible corruption spread from top league games to games in second and third division games, as well as friendlies.
    "The numbers are getting bigger and bigger so we have like Italy this year, where the phenomenon was coming back after some years of quiet there is like a new explosion. We have Belgium with two attempts of match-fixing in the last two rounds of the second division. We have Greece, Portugal, second division where everything is starting from a phantom match organised from some criminal organisation just to make money about this phantom match, a friendly phantom match. And we have the story of Sweden that is a country where the corruption is very low but in football the corruption is very high," Baranca said.
    The roots of the problems are diverse, Baranca said. In Greece and Portugal, budget cuts and economic crisis have created a breeding ground for match-fixing, Federbet said. Players who don't get paid by their clubs may be inclined to fix matches, he added.
    "The problem of football is that now the football players move very easily from one country to another country and they export this virus in a very fast way. And what is interesting, we don't have just the market, transfer market, because the football player is a good football player. We have also transfer market because the football player is a good cheater," he said.
    The report is especially critical of Ukraine and Cyprus. In Ukraine, many teams were involved, from U19 and U12 all the way to the first division, the report said. In Cyprus, Federbet alleged, the embezzlement is such that only supporters in the stadium did not know the result of the game.
    Cyprus international referee Marios Panyi decided to speak up. He went to politicians to denounce the corruption but said nothing has been done. He described a climate where referees and players who don't engaged in match-fixing feel threatened.
    "A friend of mine, he is like my brother, his car was burnt three or four months ago, and the strange (thing) in this situation is that this referee he has very good matches so the people was not against him and also he is a referee that the presidents of the clubs, everyone, trust him. So in this situation may be it was an indirect message to me," Panyi said.
    Referees have always been considered a soft target for Cypriot football hooligans seeking to vent their anger and the sport has been hit by allegations of corruption. There has also been a worrying upsurge in violence with six criminal attacks targeting soccer officials in a year.
    Panayi wants the system to be overhauled, from the implementation of stricter laws and a restructuring of the Cyprus Football Association (CFA) and referees' association to exclude those who cheat.
    Tarabella said it's about time politicians get involved and set up new standards.
    "I repeat it, even if this is not directly our field of expertise, I think it's about time that the European Union gets involved at different levels, including in the European Parliament which is the democratically elected assembly, gets involved in this phenomenon, this problem. It has become a problem obviously because bad governance is getting highlighted more and more. The President is triumphantly reelected, well, at least he is triumphing. He is the only one to consider it's completely normal that he is at the helm. This is a problem," Tarabella said.
    Tarabella said he hoped to organise a debate in the plenary session of the European Parliament next week and an event in September.
    Federbet said it is behind the "Dirty Soccer" investigation into a mafia-linked match-fixing scandal in Italy that led to the arrest and incarceration of 19 person.
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