By Alexander Krassimirov
August 4 – A Bulgarian national youth team player has been arrested on suspicion of manipulating U19 matches. Although the Bulgarian Football Union (BFU) has not released the name of the 20-year-old player it is known that he is plays in Bulgaria’s A Grupa.
The investigation interviewed players who played in the national team that played in the European Junior Championships in Hungary. Media speculation has been around the involvement of former Lokomotiv Sofia goalkeeper Daniel Ghiaurov. According to local television Steven Petkov from Ludogorets is also among those involved.
Two weeks prior to the arrest, the BFU’s integrity expert Mario Kosturkov flagged an attempt to manipulate the results of matches of the U19 national team to the police.
“As a result of an on-going investigation numerous individuals have been questioned, including current internationals from the U19 national team. These players are at elite clubs from A Group, and (the investigation) required information and assistance from their clubs,” said a BFU statement. ”The Bulgarian Football Union would like to express its gratitude to those clubs in maintaining the confidentiality and for co-operating fully in the investigation.”
The BFU believes that the investigation influenced the performance of the national team at the U19 European Championship – the investigation had begun before the championship had started following a tip-off. In Hungary, the Bulgarian U19s recorded three losses; 3-0 against the eventual champions Germany, and 1:0 against Ukraine and Serbia.
“The tension was very, very high because we learned about this hours before we took off for Vienna. I am proud of my players – they told me they were offered bribes for simulated play to lose disastrous in Hungary. This had a negative impact on our performance during the European Championship,” said Bulgaria’s U19 coach Alexander Dimitrov.
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