Football Betting Scandal: Match Fixing

Match-fixing on the rise, 24 countries affected say experts
Reuters, Berlin, 9.2.2011
Some 24 European countries have been affected by match-fixing and up to 100 games have been manipulated in the past five months alone, said a betting watchdog official on Wednesday. Speaking as an expert witness at a match-fixing trial in Bochum, Germany, Sportradar CEO Carsten Koerl said match-fixing was on the rise given the financial incentives involved: “In the past five months we assume that between 70 and 100 games in Europe were manipulated.”

Four suspects are on trial after a 2009 German police operation unearthed a European match-fixing ring with more than 200 suspected members who fixed or tried to fix around 200 matches across the continent, including three in the Champions League. Initial estimates had put the illegal gains at about 10 million euros but court officials said the figure was just “the tip of the iceberg.”

Up to one hundred fixtures manipulated in the past five months
Spiegel Online, 9.2.1011 (Article is in German)
Those pulling the strings in the largest scandal in European football must answer for themselves before court, but worldwide their manipulation of match outcomes is being busily continued. In 24 countries, fixtures have allegedly been manipulated, and in the past five months up to one hundred parties were involved it was announced…

FC Bayern Munich and others vs. Boksic Robin
Court sitting in the LG Hamburg 324 O 543/10, 4.2.2011 (Article is in German)
The court session lasted over one hour. Five legally trained solicitors with doctorate degrees – Ventd, Wiese, Dunckel, Link, Maatsch – faced the defendant and his lawyer (no doctoral degree). It was a negotiation which would be worthwhile as an academic course.

However, it was a spicy one. The plaintiff’s representative also has the Osmani family as clients who are active sponsors in football circles and likewise active in player transfers. Thus we find interesting stuff about Nelson Valdez in the Internet. There is also a well-known goalkeeper who was cared for by Osmani and thereupon resigned from football. The player didn’t agree with the conditions of his coach.

Champions League game named in match-fixing trial
The Express Tribune, 21.5.2010
The Champions League was on Friday dragged into the Europe-wide betting scandal after a group stage match was named in the trial of six men accused of match-fixing. The Group E match between Hungarian side Debreceni VSC and Italy’s Fiorentina on October 20 2009, which finished in a 4-3 win for the Italians, has been named as one of those allegedly fixed by the group.

Football match-fixing: How betting gives the game away
BBC news Europe, 19.11.2010
Some 300 football games a season are fixed in Europe’s top leagues, experts say… The former German football manager Sepp Herberger once famously said that people go to football matches because they do not know who will win. I have just watched a match in the almost certain knowledge not only of who would win, but with a fairly shrewd idea of what the score would be.

Suspect scorelines: It is Saturday morning in a small office in southwest London. “We’ve been watching this for a couple of weeks now,” he says. “The odds have gone to a very suspicious level. We believe that this game will finish in an away victory. Usually an away team would have around a 30% chance of winning, but at the current odds this team is about 85% likely to win.”

German Magazine Stern Uncovers UEFA scandal
FinanzNachrichten.de, 15.09.2010 (Article is in German)
The UEFA watchdog in charge, Peter Limacher, who was heavily celebrated in quashing football scandals now comes under criticism himself: According to investigations by the Hamburg magazine Stern, Limacher has been fooled several times by impostors. Among other things there are accusations that FC Bayern Munich sold the UEFA Cup semi-final second leg in 2008 versus Zenith St. Petersburg (0: 4) to the Russian mafia…


What effect do the above stories have on the ‘small’ bettor, who regularly lays out bets on his or her sport of choice, follows their team enthusiastically, analyses fixtures, form and statistics with a passion, only to find out it is all pointless due to darker forces in the beautiful game?