Ireland vulnerable to match-fixing scourge

More than 12% of athletes have played in a fixed sporting event, according to research carried out at the University of Limerick, writes Larry Ryan.

And one of the report authors fears Ireland is vulnerable to corruption because our sports don’t have the same athlete supports found in other countries, while failure to act on corruption in sport will mean “viewership, spectatorship and participation are all at risk”, warned MEP Sean Kelly at the launch of the report yesterday.

Tadhg MacIntyre is a lecturer in physical education and sports sciences and has worked as a sports psychologist with Munster Rugby. He and UL colleague Deirdre O’Shea have produced the EU-funded Fix the Fixing: Proactive Quelling of Sports Events Manipulation research, which assessed responses from more than 600 sports people across six EU states — Ireland, United Kingdom, Austria, Greece, France and Cyprus.