By Andrew Warshaw
December 9 – A one-time English Premier League footballer and Nigerian international has admitted being involved in spot-fixing in a second damaging newspaper sting that has led to six people being detained and has once again seriously undermined the reputation and credibility of English football.
Just over a week after the Daily Telegraph uncovered a scam that focussed on lower-league players, leading to an investigation by the National Crime Agency, former Portsmouth defender Sam Sodje (pictured) told an undercover reporter he was another culprit of the global matchfixing epidemic.
Sodje was filmed by the Sun on Sunday describing how he punched an opponent in a League One fixture – the third tier of English football – to deliberately get a red card in exchange for £70,000 while playing for Portsmouth, the last club of his career.
According to the paper, Sodje, who once played in the Premier League for Reading and has won four caps for Nigeria, allegedly also boasted he had arranged for a fellow professional in the Championship, the second tier of the English game, to get a yellow card in return for tens of thousands of pounds, and that he could even rig top-flight fixtures.
Portsmouth, a once-proud club which has been in decline because of a succession of financial and ownership crises and is now in the bottom rung of the professional pyramid in League Two, said in a statement: “If these serious allegations are true then we are extremely shocked and saddened by them, as match-fixing of any type goes to the heart of the integrity of the game.
“The player in question no longer plays for the club and we have not been contacted by the authorities, but of course we would co-operate fully with any inquiry.”
Sodje was sent off in the 50th minute of Portsmouth’s League One match against Oldham Athletic on February 23 after twice lashing out unprovoked at another player. He was suspended for six games and the club’s manager at the time, Guy Whittingham, said nobody could understand why he reacted in that way.
“Sam came racing over – and I didn’t actually see the incident at the time itself – but then you see it in the cold light of day afterwards and you see what he’s done and you can’t fathom out why he’s done it,” said Whittingham.
With the second and third tiers of English football now caught up in match-fixing allegations, the current investigation blows away the insistence from English clubs and managers that match-fixing was not a problem in the top four divisions – the previous investigation focussed on low-paid players from the ‘non-league game’, the Football Conference.
The Sun on Sunday also reported that an Oldham player, Cristian Montano, apologised to Sodje after failing to get a yellow card in the first half of a League One match against Wolverhampton Wanderers as recently as on October 22.
Oldham said in a statement: “Oldham Athletic Football Club has been made aware of the incident and allegation surrounding one of its players, Cristian Montano. The club will commence an immediate internal investigation to establish all the relevant facts of the case.
“The club is co-operating with other agencies in this matter and cannot comment on specific facts at this stage. The club will not be issuing any further statements at this time.”
The National Crime Agency (NCA) said an “active investigation” was under way that six unnamed individuals were in custody and being questioned.
Football League chief executive Shaun Harvey encouraged anyone with any evidence to report it to the police. “We treat any allegations of criminal activity in our competitions with the utmost seriousness. We will be giving our full assistance to the police during their investigation.”
In a separate NCA investigation into an alleged international betting syndicate, two non-league footballers have already been charged with conspiracy to defraud. Michael Boateng and Hakeem Adelakun, both 22, play for Whitehawk FC, based in Brighton, in the Conference South.
Two other men, Singapore national Chann Sankaran, 33, and Krishna Sanjey Ganeshan, 43, who has dual UK and Singapore nationality, were charged with conspiracy to defraud last month. The pair have been bailed and are due to appear at Birmingham Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday.
The Sodje case immediately prompted a wave of reaction amid fears that Asia’s notorious illegal betting gangs have gained a more powerful foothold in English football than orignially thought.
Marcus Gayle, manager of Staines Town in the Conference South two divisions below the professional league, claimed his players were offered bribes just three weeks ago. The former Wimbledon and Watford player told BT Sport television he was furious when he discovered the approach, which was made to one of his players by telephone.
“We reported the incident straight away to the FA. That shows we have done the right thing. Our players are absolutely furious. I never thought match-fixing was possible but now I have changed my mind for obvious reasons, now I am convinced it’s all over the place, at least that’s how it appears to be to me.
“After what has happened at my club I am angry and I want to stand up for the integrity of the game, even if that means standing up alone, so be it. As a club I believe we have done the right thing reporting it to the FA and I am sure they will be passing on that information to the police. We reported it to the FA 24 hours after I found out about it.
“It does worry me just how much is going on in the game at the moment, and I am sure it is far more than people think.”
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