Match officials banned by FIFA in match-fixing scandal

By Andrew Warshaw

August 10 – Six match officials were banned for life by FIFA today in the latest move to clean up the game and stamp out corruption.

The bans followed an investigation into a series of suspect friendly games held in February in Turkey where Estonia and Bulgaria drew 2-2 and Latvia beat Bolivia 2-1, all seven goals coming from penalties.

FIFA’s Disciplinary Panel imposed the sanction against four Hungarians and three Bosnians following a hearing at its headquarters in Zurich.

More recently the scandal has widened to include some of Turkey’s own clubs with the courts formally charging a raft of suspects and issuing a warrant for Fenerbahce President Aziz Yildirim, accused of bribing rival teams’ players.

Fenerbahce won the title on last day of last season on goal difference after closest rivals and season pacesetters Trabzonspor were held to a draw.

Fenerbahce thereby qualified directly for the group stages of the Champions League, with associated the financial windfall.

In another development today, in the ongoing fallout from the FIFA Presidential election bribery scandal, football’s world governing body banned Lisle Austin, the former acting President of CONCACAF, for one year after he attempted to go to the civil courts in the Bahamas to get his job back.

Austin took over as interim President when Jack Warner, his long-time ally, was suspended in May by FIFA over the bribery allegations.

Shortly afterwards Austin tried to fire CONCACAF general secretary Chuck Blazer, the whistle-blower who initially brought the bribery claims against Warner and Mohamed Bin Hammam to FIFA’s attention.

But CONCACAF said at the time that Austin did not have the authority to take such action and suspended him from football duties effective from June 2.

FIFA then extended that to ensure it applied worldwide – resulting in Austin taking legal action and in the process breaching FIFA rules by going to the civil courts.

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