The extent of potential corruption in tennis is "under scrutiny once more after a leading sports gambling watchdog stated that 73 matches suspected of suspicious betting activity were reported to the Tennis Integrity Unit" in '15 -- more than three times the number of incidents involving any other sport, according to Ed Aarons of London GUARDIAN. There were allegations during the Australian Open that 16 players who have been ranked in the top 50 had been "repeatedly flagged to the TIU over suspicions they had thrown matches in the past decade." However, new evidence released by the European Sports Security Association -- which issues suspicious betting alerts to regulated bookmakers across Europe when irregular activity is spotted -- in its quarterly integrity report on Thursday revealed 73 tennis matches "had been flagged up to the authorities" in '15, with 24 occurring in the final three months of last year. In comparison, football attracted 19 cases throughout the whole of '15, with eight of those occurring between October and December, while three other sports -- greyhound racing, snooker and ice hockey -- "had one case each in the final quarter." The report said, “The start of 2016 has seen a worldwide focus on alleged match-fixing in tennis. The data contained in ESSA’s Q1-3 reports has been used to highlight those concerns." Geographically, 38 of the alerts originated in Europe, 24 in Asia, 16 in North America and 11 in South America. Africa accounted for nine. Most of the cases of suspicious betting in football "occurred in European matches, which featured in 68% of cases in that sport." Tennis was "more evenly spread globally," led by Asia (19), Europe (18) and North America (14) (GUARDIAN, 2/18). REUTERS' Alan Baldwin reported tennis governing bodies "set up an independent review panel" last month following media reports criticizing the TIU for "not adequately investigating some 16 players repeatedly flagged over suspicions they had thrown matches in the past decade." The review will take "at least a year to investigate allegations of corruption in tennis and the effectiveness of existing procedures." Match-fixing allegations by the BBC and online BuzzFeed News "broke before last month's Australian Open (REUTERS, 2/18).
PLAYER BANNED: The AFP reported the London-based TIU said that Jatuporn Na Lamphun has been banned from tennis for 18 months and fined "after being found guilty of offences under the Tennis Anti-Corruption Program." Jatuporn, 22, is unranked, "but is considered an up-and-coming" tennis player. He admitted to three offenses of betting on tennis matches between July and Nov. '14, and was "found guilty of a further offence of failing to cooperate with the TIU investigation" (AFP, 2/18).
