With fresh and damning allegations leveled at Pakistan cricket team members currently touring England, match fixing is again in the spotlight
There is a great article in the Sydney Morning Herald today looking at some of the better publicized betting scandals over the last decade.
From Europe to Asia, cricket to football, minor indiscretions to ridiculously obvious acts (like trying to score an own goal to lose a game of soccer) it is blatantly clear that wherever the game is, and whatever the game is, potential for match fixing exists.
While lower paid sportsmen are always going to be the softer target for the betting syndicates instigating fixes, there are many exceptions to this rule. Even higher profile sports where players are earning the kind of mega-bucks that you would think would make them immune to bribes have been effected. Recent arrests connected to European football match fixing are evidence of this.
The NFL has long been a vocal opponent to regulated online sports betting in the US. And I must admit after I can understand their concerns. Their lobbying brought about an amendment to Barney Frank's HR2267 to exclude sports betting from the list of legal online gambling activities prescribed by that legislation.
Mind you, the absence of legal and regulated online sports betting certainly hasn't been an impediment to rife betting scandals across Asian and the sub-continent.
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