The arrests took place in the provinces of Badajoz, Seville, Almer\u00eda, and C\u00e1diz. All 10 face accusations of belonging to a criminal organization, corruption between individuals in sports, and defrauding gambling operators.<\/p>\n
\n
Among the players that police arrested are four out of southern cities like Jerez de la Frontera, Cadiz, Rota, and San Lucar de Barrameda. In addition, another has ties to a team in Zaragoza in Spain\u2019s northern region of Aragon.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The individuals involved allegedly bet large amounts of money on the games whose results they had previously secured. To keep the bets from raising suspicions, they made them in conjunction with bets on other games, like First Division matches, in which the final result was predictable.<\/p>\n
Operation Coniferous<\/em> has been in play for several years. In May 2021, The General Directorate of Gambling Regulation (DGOJ, for its Spanish acronym), which falls under the Ministry of Finance, detected an unusual volume of bets for a Third Division duel and sounded the alarm.<\/strong><\/p>\nFrom that moment on, the case was taken over by the National Police Center for Integrity in Betting and Sport (Cenpida, for its Spanish acronym) of the National Police. This is the same unit that, in May 2019, led the Oikos<\/em> match-fixing investigation. That uncovered a plot that former players Ra\u00fal Bravo and Carlos Aranda created to allegedly manipulate First, Second and Third Division matches.<\/p>\nBecause Operation Coniferous<\/em> is still in motion, it\u2019s likely police will make more arrests. At least one of the initial 10 will break his silence in order to cut a deal, giving investigators more data on the scope of the operation.<\/p>\nCrackdown on Match-Fixing Continues<\/h2>\n Match-fixing in sports is an issue, but not an exaggerated one. For example, the International Betting Integrity Association (IBIA) reported 42 cases of suspicious betting to the relevant authorities of various countries during the first quarter of 2022. That was 39% fewer cases than in the first quarter of last year.<\/p>\n
Given the number of sports contests in action at any time, and the reach the IBIA has, the figure is extremely low. However, there is still a lot of attention directed at the control of sports to rid it of manipulation.<\/strong><\/p>\nSpain\u2019s LaLiga brought in Stats Perform<\/a> to lend a hand earlier this year. The IBIA is also present, as it is in other countries that have become targets for manipulators.<\/p>\nThe IBIA reported 236 cases of suspicious sports betting to the relevant authorities last year. This number represented a decrease of 13% of the 270 cases reported in 2020.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Spain is making a concerted effort to tackle match-fixing in sports, and is finding success. Its latest initiative has already led to the arrest of 10 people, with more likely to fall. Police arrested 10 people for their alleged involvement in the rigging of soccer matches of the First and Second categories of the Royal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":218529,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1074],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
Soccer Match-Fixing Net Widens as Spain Arrests 10 - Casino.org<\/title>\n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n \n \n \n \n \n\t \n\t \n\t \n