Some Cases of Match Fixing in Europe but Little Evidence to Sport the Crime

The Netherlands KNVB, comes across its first concrete match-fixing case.

Willem II, Dutch Eredivisie top-tier football club, has taken center stage in football and Dutch gambling news but its not for their great play but rather because the team got caught in a match-fixing accusation saga. This took root way back in the 2009-10 football season when the team’s games were reportedly fixed.

It has been reported that match-fixers from Singapore advanced money to Willem ll football players, in the tune of $115,000, for the team to lose games, with a certain goal difference. The matches involved are Willem II’s Ajax game and the Feyenoord games, played in October and December 2009, respectively.

Willem II lost according to plan with at least three goals difference for the first match The fixer, Asian gambling syndicate, made an approximately €1 million in the mobile betting market. However, Willem II couldn’t help themselves in the second match and could only lose by two-goals , which was apparently not what they were paid to do.

Top Willem ll player leaves club after scandal

Ibrahim Kargo, one of the players involved in the crooked transaction, has since taken leave of the club. Kargo admitted that indeed, he was offered money to play foul, but never took up on the offer as, according to Dutch gambling laws, that would have been considered a criminal act to do so.

The Dutch football’s governing body, KNVB, acknowledged that the Willem ll issue was “most concrete match-fixing case ever in the Netherlands” and asked for a criminal investigation like their counterparts in the UK, who carried out investigations recently into more recent match-fixing incidents.

In November 2013, over in the UK, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said that there were investigations going on against 13 footballers for match-fixing. The case never went to court as there was a lack of evidence.

In April 2014, seven players from Football League clubs were also arrested in connection with alleged spot-fixing, and again, the CPS has now ruled that there is not enough evidence to “provide a realistic prospect of conviction”. Last year, FIFA’s ballon d’or 2014 predictions in the Premier League saw Lionel Messi and a top early contender.