now why would this make anyone suspect match-fixing?
The Guardian reports a very amusing scandal in Ghanaian football. If two teams both won on the last day of their season, promotion to the top division would be decided by goal difference. At half-time it was 1-0 to the promotion hopefuls in each game. Then, it is alleged, both managers or other interested parties bribed the opposition to concede a few extra goals in the second half…
Final scores: one finished 28-0, the other 31-0. All four teams involved have been punished by relegation, fines and loads of suspensions (46 people, a year each). Manager of the team that had, for a moment, won promotion is Abedi Pele, who I remember as a terrific player. He says “My contention is that while the scoreline may raise eyebrows, it doesn’t provide irrefutable proof that the match was fixed.” Of course he is right, and when I am elected the next Miss World I plan to use the same argument, that a highly unattractive 47 year old man may be a surprising winner, but that doesn’t prove anything underhand is involved.
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stevem on April 19th, 2007
They should’ve at least checked with each other first to make sure they didn’t both have the same idea.
FT's CarsmileSteve on April 19th, 2007
imagine Jeff Stelling doing soccer saturday as these scores came in, i think he might have actually exploded, he was excited enough when forfar got 7 or 8 put past them the other week…
Pete on April 20th, 2007
Suspicion of match fixing in Ghana = 46 players full year suspension.
In Italy?
Ben on April 20th, 2007
Apparently you could lip-read Stelling saying the “f-word” when Barnet took the lead against Hartlepool two weeks ago!
Abedi Pele was a class act. Only three players have ever won African Footballer Of The Year three times, and Abedi Pele was the first to do it (and did it with three consecutive wins, beating off competition from the likes of Tony Yeboah and Francois Oman-Biyik). From 1989 onwards, the winners of African Footballer of the Year were:
89: George Weah
90: Roger Milla
91: Abedi Pele
92: Abedi Pele
93: Abedi Pele
94: George Weah
95: George Weah
96: Nwankwo Kanu
97: Victor Ikpeba
98: Mustapha Hadji
99: Nwankwo Kanu
00: Patrick Mboma
01: El Hadj Diouf
02: El Hadj Diouf
03: Samuel Eto’o
04: Samuel Eto’o
05: Samuel Eto’o
06: Didier Drogba
FT's Martin Skidmore on April 20th, 2007
Perhaps he will be getting a manager of the year award now, for that rather convincing win in a crucial match.