Players are easy prey for match-fixers, who are now so rampant they are believed to operate in nearly every Asian football league, from Singapore to South Korea and most countries in between.
The players are short of money and unhappy. Perhaps they have big debts. Perhaps their careers, which once promised so much, are petering out into nothing.
Whatever the reason, they are easy prey for match-fixers, who are now so rampant they are believed to operate in nearly every Asian football league, from Singapore to South Korea and most countries in between.
“We’re not talking about (UEFA) Champions League or the World Cup finals or anything like that,” said Britain-based Scott Ferguson, a consultant to the betting industry.
“We’re talking domestic-level games where they’re on a fairly mediocre wage. When someone comes up and offers a couple of grand (thousand dollars) to do this, their ears prick up.”The operation is simple: approach a player or official, often through a manager or a friend, and make an offer — or a threat. Then place the bet, usually at high odds, and collect.
In one case, a punter appeared holding a bag of cash at a Hong Kong betting shop, and wagered the lot on a South Korean football match. It was no surprise when the game turned out as he predicted.
“There’s all sorts of things that can be done. It invariably comes with having some sort of in-road to the team, whether it’s via a manager or via socially having some connection to the club,” Ferguson said.
“The less conspicuous you can make it, so it can be put down to just being a normal part of the game, the more easy it is to get away with.”One target of the fixers seems to have been Jeong Jong-Kwan, a talented midfielder who once touched the heights of Asian football when he helped South Korea’s Jeonbuk Motors win the 2006 AFC Champions League.
But Jeong had fallen on hard times. After serving jail time for avoiding military service, the 29-year-old was playing for third-tier Seoul United, his career on the slide.
On May 30, a hotel worker in Seoul’s Apgujeong-dong district found Jeong hanging dead in his room, after an apparent suicide linked to a widespread fixing scam which has rocked Korean football.
“I’m ashamed of myself as a person involved in the match-fixing scandal,”said a note near the body, according to media reports.
“Those under investigation are all my friends and they haven’t blown my name because of friendship. All is my fault and I got them involved.”Jeong’s death came among an unprecedented run of bad news for Korean soccer including the top-tier K-League, one of Asia’s wealthiest and most successful football competitions.
Police were already probing match-fixing links in the suicide of Incheon United goalkeeper Yoon Ki-Won, who was found dead in his car with a half-burnt charcoal briquette and an envelope containing one million won ($930).
Last week the K-League responded by banning 10 accused players for life — the toughest penalty in its 28-year history — even before they had been found guilty. Eight of them are from the same K-League club, Daejeon Citizen.
“We made the decision, determined that this would be the first and the last match-fixing scandal in the league,” said Kwak Young-Cheol, head of the K-League’s disciplinary committee.
That is perhaps wishful thinking. After all, match-fixing has even hit England’s super-rich Premier League, notably when a Malaysian syndicate was found to have tampered with floodlights at stadiums in the 1990s.
In 2005, German referee Robert Hoyzer was jailed for fixing matches including a first-round German Cup tie in which he sent off a striker and awarded the other team two dubious penalties.
And Italian giants Juventus were stripped of two Serie A titles and demoted in the 2006 “calciopoli” scandal which found several clubs tried to rig results by selecting compliant referees.
But Asian corruption is on another level. In China, the troubled Super League lost its title sponsor and national TV deal after rampant bribery and cheating, long suspected by fans, left several top officials facing trial.
Malaysia, where the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) is based, suffers from graft so pervasive officials warn it is “destroying” the sport, with gangs which have repeatedly been linked to scams in Europe.
Even Singapore’s tiny S-League has suffered serious match-fixing problems, and a Singaporean man is now on trial for allegedly rigging matches in faraway Finland.
Thailand, Hong Kong and Vietnam have all battled major scandals, decimating local support and helping push fans towards European football, especially the wildly popular English Premier League.
“No (Asian) national league is free of corruption. Corruption is rife everywhere,” said former AFC general secretary Peter Velappan, who said it was largely the fault of clubs which pay their players late or poorly.
“These guys they get married, they have family, they have a posh car, so who is going to pay for this?” Velappan said.
Courtesy of FIFA...
FIFA's historic contribution to INTERPOL in fight against match fixing.
FIFA President Joseph S. Blatter and INTERPOL Secretary General Ronald K. Noble
Global efforts to prevent corruption in football today reached a milestone with the announcement that world football’s governing body, FIFA, is to donate to INTERPOL the largest grant it has ever received from a private institution to create an unprecedented ten-year programme worth millions of euros a year at a dedicated FIFA Anti-Corruption Training Wing within the INTERPOL Global Complex (IGC) in Singapore.
The announcement was made by FIFA President Joseph S. Blatter and INTERPOL Secretary General Ronald K. Noble at a press conference held at the Home of FIFA in Zurich. Under the agreement, INTERPOL will receive €4 million in each of the first two years, followed by €1.5 million in each of the following eight years.
INTERPOL’s longest-ever funded initiative will target illegal and irregular betting and match-fixing, the scale of which has been highlighted by recent fixing allegations and the involvement of Asian gambling syndicates in global match-fixing – with estimates by INTERPOL’s global law enforcement network that illegal football gambling is worth up to hundreds of millions of US dollars in Asia alone each year.
In this respect, the initiative will provide cutting-edge training, education and prevention to protect the sport, the players and the fans from fraud and corruption.
“The threat of match-fixing in sport is a major one, and we are committed to doing everything in our power to tackle this threat,” said President Blatter. “In the fight against illegal betting and match-fixing, the preventive measures that can be taken and the protection of the players and the integrity of the game are of the utmost importance. Joint work with the authorities and with INTERPOL is crucial for success, and for this reason we are very pleased to announce this contribution today, which will further enhance our cooperation,” he added.
During the press conference, FIFA also announced the creation of an internal Betting Integrity Investigation Task Force, which will comprise members of FIFA’s Legal Division and Security Department, as well as the Early Warning System GmbH.
The threat of match-fixing in sport is a major one, and we are committed to doing everything in our power to tackle this threat.
FIFA President Joseph S. Blatter
“Match-fixing shakes the very foundations of sport, namely fair play, respect and discipline. That’s why FIFA employs a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to any infringement of these values,” concluded the FIFA President.
INTERPOL Secretary General Ronald K. Noble hailed FIFA’s and President Blatter’s commitment to keeping the world’s most popular and influential sport clean. “By funding a long-term corruption prevention training programme to be designed and implemented by INTERPOL – the world’s largest international police institution with 188 member countries – to counter transnational organised crime’s attempts to corrupt the sport and its players, officials and administrators, FIFA has taken a significant step towards ensuring the integrity of football worldwide,” said INTERPOL Secretary General Noble.
“As INTERPOL and FIFA look to the future, basing this anti-corruption initiative at INTERPOL’s upcoming Global Complex in Singapore while delivering training programmes from INTERPOL Regional Bureaus and offices all over the world will help both INTERPOL and FIFA achieve their common goal of keeping the world’s most popular sport free of the corrupt influences of transnational organised crime syndicates.”
“Illicit betting and match-fixing rings have demonstrated their global reach to fundamentally undermine football from one continent to another by corrupting administrators, officials and players and they require a global response,” said Secretary General Noble.
Endorsing the initiative, the World Bank’s Vice-President of Integrity, Leonard McCarthy, said: “Corruption should always be offside. Cleaning-up initiatives are a much-needed golden goal against corruption, and an important step toward keeping football worthy of its nickname: the beautiful game.”
Secretary General Noble outlined how links had been established between match-fixing, illegal betting and organised crime at international level and how organised criminals frequently engage in loan-sharking and use intimidation and violence to collect debts, forcing their desperate, indebted victims into drug smuggling and their family members into prostitution.
“Today’s agreement between INTERPOL and FIFA therefore provides a unique opportunity to challenge corruption both on and off the pitch,” concluded the head of INTERPOL.
INTERPOL has co-ordinated several successful operations targeting illegal gambling in Asia, with SOGA III, conducted throughout the 2010 FIFA World Cup™, involving police across China (including Hong Kong and Macau), Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand and resulting in the arrest of more than 5,000 individuals with raids conducted on nearly 800 illegal gambling dens which had handled more than USD 155 million worth of bets.
The programme will create a continuous learning and operational platform for all officials involved directly or indirectly in international and national football. It will also deliver regional training and advice at international football events such as the FIFA World Cup™ and FIFA Club World Cup, as well as at youth competitions ranging from U-17 to U-20 events.
So Asia...'To Be Forewarned is to be Foresighted'.
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