Football match-fixing in the UK: there's smoke but no fire

If you were to walk into any betting shop on the high street and ask for £1,000 on Player A to receive a yellow card in a Football League match the cashier would say ‘I just need to call head office’. Later you would be told the wager would not be accepted. They would suspect foul play.

Therein lies the problem with the sensational allegations about match-fixing in English football. Amid such media storms, rarely is the question asked:  can you actually make money betting on it?

The answer, almost certainly, is no. Sam Sodje’s claims that he can arrange for footballers to receive a yellow card for £30,000 are troubling but they are far from proof of fixing. And it does not require a huge amount of common sense to understand why not.  

High street UK bookmakers do accept bets on a variety of markets which involve yellow or red cards. Occasionally, it is possible to bet on an individual player to be booked.

However, bookmakers restrict gamblers to small stakes for fear that such betting opportunities can be manipulated. On average an individual player  would be around 4-1 to receive a yellow card. A gambler would be allowed no more, if he was lucky, than a £250 stake. Consider the number of wagers needed to be placed for the ‘corruptor’ in this instance to win back his £30,000 bribe.

With winnings of £1,000 per bet the ‘fixer’ would need to place 30 separate bets. In the heavily regulated UK market that is impossible. Markets are shut down at the merest whiff of a suspicious betting pattern, which would normally constitute a run of four of five such wagers across the industry.

But what about the illegal bookmakers in Asia, surely they would take the bets? No chance. The ‘grey’ betting markets, which are somewhere between legal and illegal, based in the Philippines, do not offer punters’ the chance to bet on cards of any hue. Nor do the authentic black market operators in the back streets of Hanoi or Singapore.

The Sun, it would appear, have uncovered corrupt attitudes within the English game. With no bet placed and no opportunity to do so, however, it cannot be called match-fixing.

This article was first published in The Times on December 10