On Monday, the European anti-crime agency, Europol, revealed that they identified about 680 suspicious matches, including qualifying games for the World Cup, European Championships and the UEFA Champions League. Europol has formed a Joint Investigation Team, codenamed Veto, to co-ordinate Europe-wide operations against football match-fixing.
The fixing could include top-fight national league matches in several European countries, as well as two Champions League matches. Most of the betting on fixed matches is placed on Asian markets, which are less well regulated than European matches and they allow in-match betting on incidents in the games, rather than just on the results. Europol stated that they had uncovered an organised crime syndicate based in Singapore that was co-ordinating the operation and was liaising with criminal networks throughout Europe. These revelations about the scale of the scandal could damage Singapore’s squeaky-clean image as one of the world’s least corrupt nations.
One man believed to be behind this scandal is Singaporean Tan Seet Eng, also known as Dan Tan. He has previously helped fix games in over 50 countries across the world and he is the subject of an international arrest warrant issued by Interpol, and wanted by authorities in Italy and Hungary. According to German authorities, Tan has links with attempts to fix a Premier League match in 1999 although Dan Tan has not yet been arrested or charged with any offence in Singapore. In the latest indication that the Asian city-state is at the heart of a global match-fixing empire, the Singapore police have said that they are helping European authorities in their investigation.
The Europol inquiry started 18 months ago and initially involved Germany, Finland and Hungary, before being extended to Slovenia and Austria. Eventually they ended up looking at 680 matches in 30 countries where approximately 13,000 emails were analysed. In total, 425 suspects were identified and 50 people arrested with 80 search warrants obtained. A number of criminal investigations are now taking place, most notably on the Champions League game between Liverpool and Debrecen in 2009 where the Anfield club were victorious 1-0.
