Germany shines spotlight on lower league “fixing”: TV

December 1, 2009

More than 60 matches have been fixed in Germany’s second division and lower leagues, broadcaster ARD reported on Monday, citing a witness while a third division player was sacked after admitting to wrongdoing.

The public prosecutor in the western city of Bochum had earlier this month indicated that 32 suspect matches had been identified.

However, ARD’s investigative programme Fakt quoted a witness from Hamburg of Serbian origin that more matches were involved and that a second division side had been relegated as a result.

Third division side SV Sandhausen said meanwhile it had dismissed a player, Marcel Schuon, following the Bochum investigation which indicated wrongdoing while he was playing for Osnabruck.

“Sandhausen has never been mired in scandal and can have nothing to do with this,” manager Tobias Gebert said.

Schuon’s lawyer told the press that his client had agreed to influence game scores but added that the player had not gone through with the plan.

According to the ARD witness, the matches under the spotlight include five from the second division while “in 80 percent of cases the manipulations succeeded and we got the outcome we wanted.”

The witness said he was close to Ante Sapina, a German of Croatian origin who is alleged to have helped to instigate a betting ring.

He added that one club was relegated from the second division after two matches in a row were rigged.

The four teams who went down were Essen, Unterhaching, Burghausen and Braunschweig.

Aside from Schuon, the skipper of regional league side SC Verl, Patrick Neumann, has also been caught up in the Bochum dragnet. His club suspended him last week.

Spiegel Online magazine said earlier that UEFA had suspended a Ukrainian referee believed to have been caught up in the affair.

Last week, the German Football Federation (DFB) and the German Football League (DFL) announced the creation of a task force here to probe the betting scandal, which has rocked European football.

The DFB and DFL said they would join forces to probe the affair.

“A sports federation has a duty to fight organised crime with international implications,” DFB president Theo Zwanziger said.

Police have since raided addresses across Europe, smashing what they believe is a 200-strong band bribing players, referees and coaches in nine countries to influence matches that they would then bet huge sums on.

Around 200 games played this season in Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, Croatia, Slovenia, Turkey, Hungary, Bosnia-Hercegovina and Austria are now under suspicion.

None of the 200 suspected matches were in top flight European leagues like England’s Premier League, Italy’s Serie A, Spain’s La Liga or Germany’s Bundesliga.

But the gang is still thought to have earned as much as 10 million euros (15 million dollars) in huge bets with bookmakers in Europe and Asia, primarily in China. Fifteen people were arrested in Germany and Switzerland in the raids.

Two of those arrested reportedly include two Croatian brothers living in Berlin – Ante and Milan Sapina – who were at the centre of a match-fixing scandal that rocked Germany in 2004.

The German scandal saw referee Robert Hoyzer jailed in 2005 after admitting receiving almost 70,000 euros (104,000 dollars) and a plasma television from the Croatian brothers to throw games.

BERLIN (AFP)

Tags: ante sapina, Asia, burghausen, dfl, game scores, gebert, german football federation, german football federation dfb, german football league, Germany, Hamburg, Liga, manipulations, marcel, Marcel Schuon, Milan, neumann, public prosecutor, referee, regional league, skipper, Spain, spiegel, spiegel online, theo zwanziger, Turkey, wrongdoing

Schalke rebel in dire Streits after running gauntlet of abuse

September 6, 2009

Having been relegated to Schalke 04’s reserve team, midfielder Albert Streit says he ran a gauntlet of insults from the Royal Blues fans when he played in a regional league game at the weekend.

Schalke’s coach Felix Magath suspended Streit last Wednesday and relegated him to the reserve team for an indefinite period for displaying a poor attitude in training.

But the Romanian-born player insists a small group in the 700-strong crowd hurled abuse at him for the duration of Schalke reserves’ 1-0 defeat to Waldhof Mannheim on Saturday and called for him to be replaced.

“That was simply anti-social: I was treated like a criminal,” he said after the match.

“There were ten Schalke fans and ’son of a bitch’ was one of the more harmless insults hurled at me.

“They insulted my mother and threatened me: ‘We are going to get you after the game: piss off from Schalke or you’ll have a problem’.”

Streit said he has not been intimidated by the taunts and still wants to play for Schalke’s reserves.

He is under contract until 2012, but the 29-year-old was suspended for a second time this year when Magath took exception to his attitude after Schalke were upset 1-0 by Freiburg in the Bundesliga.

Streit was also relegated to the reserves by Magath’s predecessor Fred Rutten who demoted him, Peter Lovenkrands and Carlos Grossmueller for disciplinary reasons in January.

Both have since left the club – Grossmueller is on loan while Lovenkrands was sold to Newcastle United – with Streit the only remaining rebel.

BERLIN (AFP)

Tags: albert streit, blues fans, disciplinary reasons, felix magath, gauntlet, indefinite period, insults, league game, newcastle united, peter lovenkrands, poor attitude, predecessor, regional league, rutten, schalke 04, small group, son of a bitch, streits, taunts, waldhof mannheim

Beer, bombs and bribery as Hertha scale Bundesliga

March 17, 2009

Bankruptcy, bombs, bribery and a steamboat have all played their part in Hertha Berlin’s history as the capital city club now find themselves in the unusual position of Bundesliga leaders.

Hertha are four points clear at the top of the table with ten weeks left and their success is so unexpected midfielder Sofian Chahed has even promised to buy every Hertha fan a beer if they win the title.

"Nobody saw our success coming before the season started," admitted midfielder Patrick Ebert.

"We wanted to win as many games as possible and establish ourselves near the top of the table. We have done well so far, but we still have a lot of tough games to come."

Having finished 10th for the last two seasons, Berlin must still run the gauntlet of 10 league games if Swiss coach Lucien Favre is to become only the sixth coach from outside Germany to lift the Bundesliga title.

They confirmed their pedigree as genuine contenders last month with a 2-1 win over Bayern Munich on St Valentine’s Day which won the hearts of their fans. Their history is as colourful as their blue and white strip.

The club was established in 1892 when one of their founders took a boat ride on the steamship ‘Hertha’ which bore the club’s eventual colours.

Hertha were German champions in 1930 and 1931, but after more than 200 Allied bombs hit their Plumpe Stadium during the Second World War, the club was disbanded until 1949 when a group of players fled East Germany to sign for Hertha.

The club then started playing key games at the Olympic Stadium – built by Hitler for the 1936 Games – but when the Berlin Wall went up in 1961, the club found it hard to attract top class players to the isolated city.

The result was the German Football Federation (DFB) eventually found them guilty of bribery and Hertha were banished from the Bundesliga to the regional league in 1965.

They clawed their way back to Germany’s top flight, but a match-fixing scandal in 1971 revealed the club had six million deutschmarks of debt and only the selling of their old Plumpe Stadium saved them from bankruptcy.

Since then, Berlin had failed to threaten the top of the Bundesliga – until now.

Germany defender and Hertha captain Arne Friedrich was the club’s only household name when the season started, but 17 goals from strikers Marko Pantelic and on-loan Liverpool star Andrey Voronin have raised both Berlin’s profile and league position.

After exiting both the UEFA Cup and the German Cup, Hertha now have just the domestic league on which to concentrate and with 58,753 supporters watching them beat Bayer Leverkusen 1-0 last Saturday their gates are also rising.

Ebert is typical of the hard-working ethic which has seen Favre forge his side into title contenders.

"It is a fantastic feeling to be doing so well," said the 21-year-old. "Team spirit is the crucial factor. Everyone is giving his all for the good of the team. That is what sets us apart."

Ebert says part of the success is down to Favre’s training regime since he took over in July 2007.

"Firstly, his training sessions are always varied and interesting," he said. "In addition, he works hard with the young players to show them their weaknesses and help them improve.

"He always makes time to listen to us and his qualities as a coach are beyond question. He is meticulous with his studying of the opposition and is tactically astute."

But wilting finances are Hertha’s main problem who may have to let Voronin return to Merseyside at the season’s end. The Ukrainian has scored eight goals in his last six games and wants to extend his loan stay.

"This summer we can’t spend a single cent to buy new players," warned Favre.

But for Ebert and Hertha, UEFA Cup qualification is the goal.

"I would love to read the papers at the end of the season saying we had reached the UEFA Cup – the Bundesliga title would be a bonus," he grinned."

AFP