Day -450. WorldCup2018
A few days ago I wrote, again, about the perception of corruption in Maltese football. On reflection, the next day, I thought that I should re-visit the topic for two reasons that I felt needed clarification. The first one, which may seem obvious, is that I don't actually possess any evidence of corruption, or have spoken to anybody who has had first hand experience of it. The other reason is to say that because of the above reason I should stop talking about it as I have no authority. On the contrary, my consideration of reports that I have read over the years convinced me that I should stop talking about "perceptions" and be bold enough to call them facts. If the whole world danced around perceptions without facing up to facts, nothing would ever get resolved. So the following, with a possible exception of the first story, is a presentation of reported facts. The only question may be how well reported each story was.
(If you really don't care about Maltese football you may stop reading now. If you care about football, you may also choose to stop reading, but even though this is Malta, it could happen anywhere. The Toronto Star recently had a story about bribery in the barely watched Canadian Soccer League).
Sometime between 1991 and 1992, Ally Dawson, at the time the coach of Maltese club St. Andrews returned to his native Scotland and was interviewed by a Scottish newspaper. He mentioned how corruption was rife in Maltese football. I cannot find this report anywhere but I remember very clearly a picture in a Maltese newspaper of the story. I also remember very well how, on his return to Malta, Mr. Dawson was disciplined by the Malta FA for what he said. While we, local football fans, waited for an investigation by the MFA into his allegations there was none.
In 2012, Kevin Sammut was banned from all football activities for life by UEFA after having been found guilty of helping to fix the Malta-Norway Euro 2008 qualifier. Sammut was a regular player for Malta. Two other Maltese players were acquitted of the same charges.
In 2013, two Hamrun Spartans FC officials admitted to colluding with two Hamrun players to fix a number of matches. The two officials were banned for life. The players denied the charges but in December 2014 they also received life bans after being found guilty.
In May 2015, two Maltese brothers Robert and Adrian Farrugia, one the Vice President of Msida St Joseph FC and the other the team manager of Mosta FC were named in an Italian police investigation into lower league match fixing in Italian football. Taped phone calls revealed a conversation between Robert Farrugia and Felice Bellini, his Italian accomplice, about a fix that went wrong and that Chinese gamblers were threatening to kill Adrian Farrugia because of money they didn't receive. A report in the Malta Today newspaper by Matthew Vella detailed now Bellini was an unpaid "technical director" of another Maltese club Vittoriosa Stars after being involved with two other Maltese teams. Mr. Vella reported that this unpaid position is highly suspicious as it thought to be part of the increased foreign involvement in Maltese football, brought about by international betting syndicates who can control the results of local matches through these players and individuals like Bellini.
In December 2016, Birkirkara FC's Croatian goalkeeper was arrested after his club informed the police that they suspected him of suspicious behaviour. The club president, Adrian Delia, made an impassionate plea on Facebook about the need for Maltese football to be cleaned of it's corruption dirt.. "Football has been battered."
The Times of Malta, in February 2016, published an interview with the MFA's Integrity Officer, Franz Tabone who stated, "A former president of a Maltese football club has admitted that although he started out with the intention of playing clean, he had no choice but to become the most corrupt of the lot." And more from Mr. Tabone, "The extent of the problem is evident from the statement of another ex-president, who told me that I was trying to bring down Mount Everest with a toothpick.”
Keith Micallef in The Times of Malta in November 2016 reported on a study by the global players' union, Fifpro. The study found that, "Almost one out of every six footballers playing in Malta’s top division has been approached to fix a match sometime throughout his career." And also, "the number of such incidents in Malta was more than double the global average and was classified as the eighth highest among the 53 countries which were analysed by means of a questionnaire."
In December of 2016 Franz Tabone was quoted by The Times of Malta as saying that "Match-fixing in Maltese football is more widespread" than the study suggests. “Nothing surprises me at this stage except for the low percentages flagged in the study."
Franz Tabone has been at the forefront of the MFA's battle against this disease affecting Maltese football. Whether there has been any, or at least enough, action taken is debatable. Mr. Tabone compiled a report into match fixing for the MFA in Januray 2015. In his findings he stated, "Our football is infested by people who grade the game’s sporting spirit at the lowest grade, if any."
And this, which is my favourite quote from Mr. Tabone which perfectly sums up that what I perceive to be happening in Malta is confirmed by Mr. Tabone as a researched fact: "Some football clubs finance their entire operations by manipulating matches and betting on them."
They finance their entire operations off the revenue generated from match fixing. And I spent years watching and supporting Maltese football. Supporting there criminals, "who grade the game’s sporting spirit at the lowest grade."
The above are not my facts. They are not my opinions. It is what has been reported on as fact in Maltese football. Forever, I was surrounded by Maltese people who asked me why I bothered with local football. "It's all corrupt," they always told me. That's just the perception, I believed. Perceptions are now long gone out the window.
Do I enjoy highlighting the negative? No. But if the powers that be keep whitewashing over all the problems and try to get us all to buy into the "let's all be positive" attitude nothing will ever get done.
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