Tennis Match Fixing Scandal Revealed

By: Luke Schachter

Staff Writer

During week one of the Australian Open many professional tennis players, alongside their fans, were very upset to hear that match fixing had been present in their beloved sport over the past few years.

 

13 hours before doubles partners David Marrero and Lara Arrubarrena played their match against Andrea Hlavackova and Lukasz Kubot, major betting website “Pinnacle” suspended betting on this matchup due to suspicious money flow towards one team. During the match Marrero only held his serve once, and made many mistakes a professional tennis player wouldn’t usually make, including missing three consecutive returns from his female opponent.

 

After the match Marrero stated that he played so poorly due to a knee injury, and denied that the match was fixed in any way, although this was not the first time Marrero had raised suspicion of match fixing. Once word of the match fixing scandal was exposed, many fans were stunned to hear that the elegant sport of tennis has been exposed to the corrupt world of match fixing.

 

“My heart skipped a beat when I found out about the match fixing,” said Paulo Costa, freshman. “I never expected that something like this would happen.”

 

Betting in the sports world has always been a tricky subject. Ranging from the ongoing debate on whether or not Pete Rose bet against the baseball team he played for, or the whole controversy dealing with Draft Kings and Fan Duel.

 

“Tennis is the sport I would associate least with match fixing,” said Matt Mazzamaro, freshman. “It is such a classy sport, to think professional players would throw a match for money is ridiculous.”

 

Although many fans were upset when this information was released, many of the players became upset too. Issues arose not only with the players that threw matches, but with the organization too.

 

“I just think it should be tennis that does a better job of explaining,” said Andy Murray, professional tennis player. “The more pro-active you are in educating young players, the better in matters like this.”