Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has expressed his shock over the match-fixing news and he has claimed that when the teams are revealed, the football world might be struck by a storm.
A Europol investigation has revealed that a few big clubs in England were involved in the match fixing scandals along with some international teams during the previous years.
“I was completely surprised by the number of games that were revealed to have been fixed and for me this is a real tsunami (for football),” said Wenger. “I cannot accept this. I was always a believer that there is a lot of cheating in the game and that we are not strong enough on what is happening.
“First doping, then the corruption of referees and now match-fixing. It is time we tackled these issues and people who cheat need to be punished in a very severe way. Sport is full of legends who are, in fact, cheats and we had a recent example of that. We all have a responsibility to fight against that.
“You cannot accept that someone who works a whole week to get the money to go to a game and you cheat him because all is decided before he gets to the stand. I cannot stand up for that and I cannot accept that.”
Wenger talked of the frustration he felt when his side Monaco were caught up in such scandals.
“You spend sleepless nights worrying how to win the next game, what kind of team you can pick and then you discover that what you do is pointless as it is already decided and it is all a waste of time and energy,” he reflected. “I discovered this to be true over the course of two of three seasons and it is difficult to take, but it is very hard to come up with the proof.
“You can have your own belief and I knew what was going on, but when people ask to show the proof, it is very difficult to do that. I discovered what was happening (with Marseille) over the course of two or three seasons, but it is very tough to prove that.
“In sport in general, cheating is a problem, but it is not at all a problem in the English game. That is why we are so shocked by the news this week. It is not a perfect world here, but match-fixing is not a problem in this country. I know the English media would be very harsh against that and people know that as well.”
Comments are closed.