Games to Avoid
Basically the rest of the group phase. I’ve got nothing for the next day or two.
It is the time for the fixes.
Here is what I know.
The fixers are in South Africa. They have been desperately trying to contact various teams. They have various runners and old contacts coming in and out of the hotels and training camps. They are trying ‘to do the business’ with various players and administrators.
Given these circumstances which matches should we red-flag for possible corruption?
1)Games where one team has nothing to play for. Even if they win the teams will not progress to the next stage of the competition.
2)Teams which have a history of not paying their players properly. It is the phenomenon of relative exploitation which drives fixing. The officials receive lots of money, the players comparatively little.
The games I will be watching closely are Cameroon vs. the Netherlands and Honduras vs. Switzerland. In no way do I want to suggest that I have heard anything about players on these teams being open to fixing matches. In no way do I want to suggest that even if they had been approached the players would have taken money. But I do want to say that if either of these teams loses by more than the Asian ‘spread’ of goals (2 goals and above) then FIFA should bring in their toothless tigers of investigators and begin to ask questions.
Have to post this:
Goal! Goal USA!
