Tennis Match Fixing - what's the story?

Andy Murray (L) Jo Konta (R)

There's been one huge story in the world of tennis recently - match fixing. These reports have resulted from a joint Buzz-feed - BBC report. The report basically said some of the world's top players (both past and present) have been paid a substantial amount to loose a match. The matches in question were at all levels of the sport, both smaller tournaments and grand slams - including Wimbledon. The report specifically mentions a list of 16 players who are, or have ranked inside the top 50. The players in question have been flagged to the Tennis Integrity Unit.

The first thing you're probably thinking is why would a tennis player want to throw a match? The main thing is probably due to the fact if you're ranked around 50 in the world, a person or organisation offering thousands is going to be more than any potential prize money.

The other main question is that how do you detect this kind of thing and how do you stop it? Well once a potentially dodgy match is flagged the betting odds of the match are examined. So if player X goes from 80% likely to win to 40% likely - alarm bells ring. Of course there are so many variables - like injuries and the stage of the match to take into account.

The reason why huge changes in betting flagged is because there are known syndicates in Russia, northern Italy and Sicily who have placed thousands on particular matches. When there are huge bets placed - the odds swing.

Since these reports have broken many tennis players have had their say on the matter -  Andy Murray has said both youngsters and older players need to be educated over betting, Novak Djokovic has said he was once approached but has never fixed a match whilst Roger Federer wanted to hear names because the evidence so far isn't concrete enough.

And okay - I totally realize that whilst the report says this is a huge issue we can't continue speculation. The report should be used to trigger change within the Tennis Integrity Unit rather than to guess who has been match fixing.