Tokyo: Japan`s professional football league has said an internal probe turned up no evidence to support suspicions that a recent match was fixed, as it wrestles with an embarrassing racism scandal.
The J-League launched an investigation earlier this month after a FIFA unit said it had noticed unusual online betting patterns in a March 8 game between Sanfrecce Hiroshima and Kawasaki Frontale.
Betting on football is legal in Japan. But FIFA`s Early Warning System, launched in 2007 to fight corruption in world football, spotted an abnormal rise in bets that Kawasaki would lead the match at half-time, with its rival prevailing by the final whistle.
That turned out to be a profitable bet: Sanfrecce overcame a 1-0 half-time deficit to beat Kawasaki 2-1.
After questioning players, coaches, officials, referees and other people involved in the match, the league said in a statement on its website Tuesday that there was "no trace at all" of match-fixing.
"If wrongdoing is proven, any player involved in it will be expelled (from the league) forever and any club involved in it will not survive," J-League chairman Mitsuru Murai told reporters Tuesday.
"Our technical and referee committees analysed the game by film and found nothing unusual. We even drew a second opinion from overseas."
The claims came at a bad time for the 21-year-old league as it moves to repair its image following the appearance of a racist banner at a home match for the popular Urawa Red Diamonds.
Several Urawa supporters hung a banner that read "Japanese only" in English, at an entrance to stands behind the goal at their home stadium near Tokyo during a match earlier this month.
As a penalty, the J-League ordered Urawa`s next home match on Sunday to be played in an empty stadium with no fans in attendance.
AFP
First Published: Wednesday, March 19, 2014, 15:38
