Pair accused of 'influencing the course of football matches' as FA comes under pressure to act
TWO men have been charged with fraud as British police continue their investigation into alleged match-fixing in English football. The pair, Chann Sankaran, 33, a Singaporean national and Krishna Sanjey Ganeshan, 43, who has dual UK and Singaporean nationality, will appear in court later today.
A statement issued on Thursday night by the National Crime Agency and the organised crime division of the Crown Prosecution Service said that the men had conspired to defraud bookmakers by "influencing the course of football matches".
The Daily Telegraph, which broke the story earlier in the week, says that three players and a football agent, arrested earlier this week, have been bailed while police continue their investigations. But the paper today makes more disturbing revelations, including the claim that "referees across Europe will allegedly manipulate the results of games for £20,000" and "an entire national team from an African country... is allegedly being controlled by match fixers".
Legal restrictions prevented the Telegraph from naming the country said to be in the hands of match-fixers, but the paper also revealed that World Cup qualification matches "may have been fixed by the international gambling syndicate at the centre of the British football scandal".
The alleged fixer apparently bragged to the paper that he "did the World Cup" as well as matches in Europe and Australia.
The decision to charge two people will increase the pressure on the Football Association to launch an investigation of its own into the allegations. The Telegraph says people "repeatedly tried to convince the FA to investigate suspected match-fixing, but that they had not taken basic precautions".
The FA refused to comment on Thursday night but Maria Miller, the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, promised that the Government would do "all we can to help stamp it [match-fixing] out".
Meanwhile former Premier League chief executive Rick Parry told BBC Sport that allegations of match-fixing were "no great surprise" and it was logical the criminals would target matches in the lower leagues because players' wages are far less than in the top-flight and the absence of television cameras means it would be easier to get away with fixing. Parry urged the FA to act, warning that there is "no room for complacency"
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