IBIA reports 38 cases of suspicious betting in five sports across 15 countries
Association discovered most breaches in Europe, with football attracting the most dubious bets during Q2
The International Betting Integrity Association (IBIA), has reported 38 cases of suspicious betting activity in the second quarter of this year (Q2) to the relevant authorities for further investigation.
Alarms were raised over bets on five different sports: tennis, football, beach volleyball, table tennis and esports, with the breaches spanning 15 countries.
The IBIA’s latest integrity report found that most cases were in Europe, where dubious betting was suspected on 18 occasions.
Table tennis attracted the most questionable wagers, with nine suspicious bets placed four times each in Germany and Russia, and once in the Ukraine.
Overall there were seven football bets flagged up by the IBIA, in Croatia (2), with one alarm also triggered in Gibraltar, Moldova, Russia, Spain and the Netherlands.
Spain also received two suspicious bets on tennis.
There were five bets across South America that were deemed unusual, four of which were on Brazilian football.
A further five cases of suspect betting activity was found in Asia. Three over football in Georgia, Israel and Kazakhstan, with two on tennis in Kazakhstan also reported.
Yet despite the fresh cases of possible foul play over betting in certain sports, the 38 cases found marked a 41% reduction quarter on quarter.
The reduction in cases has mainly been attributed to only six tennis alerts being reported, the lowest in the sport since the IBIA began its quarterly integrity reports in 2015.
Out of these six alerts, two were reported to the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA), as they do not relate to events sanctioned by the main tennis tours.
Yet some of the players who participated in those events may still face the ITIA’s Tennis Anti-Corruption Programme.
Khalid Ali, CEO of IBIA, said: “The 38 cases in the second quarter added to the 64 cases in the first quarter brings the mid-year total to 102 alerts reported by the association.
“Football has provided the highest number of alerts during that period with 28, followed by tennis (24) and esports (23). These three sports comprise nearly 75% of all alerts reported in the first half of 2021,” he added.
Overall, there were 150,000 football betting markets offered each year by IBIA members between 2017 and 2020.
There was an average of 52 betting alerts, or one suspicious alert for every 2,900 matches.