Summary

  • File on 4 looks at whether the tennis authorities have done enough to investigate match-fixing allegations

  • Programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4 at 20:00 GMT

  1. Postpublished at 20:43

    That's all from the programme but if you missed it or want to listen again, it is available to download here.

  2. Postpublished at 20:42

    BBC Radio 4 reporter Simon Cox on File on 4: "Since our revelations – the world number one Novak Djokovic has said he was offered 140k to throw a match, Andy Murray says there has to be more education on this – it isn’t going away – tennis joins a growing list of sports – football, athletics under scrutiny over integrity."

  3. Postpublished at 20:40

    Chris Kermode, chief executive of the ATP: "We are trying to eradicate any of this wrongdoing in our sport, the sport treats this so seriously, because it is imperative that the product is real.  

    "Sport is a real product and that’s why it’s so successful and why tennis is I think in the best place it’s ever been because it is real and you know it’s in our duty and in our interests to keep it real. 

    "We’ve got to be vigilant and we cannot be complacent and we are constantly reviewing the program, but you know as I said, there is no reason why the sport wants to cover anything up because that is just not in our interests."

  4. Postpublished at 20:37

    Quote Message

    It is worse now than five years ago. They first contact the people around the players to get information about them and then they ask or they said to the player look I bet on you today I don't want to lose my money.

    Former Spanish player on File on 4

  5. Postpublished at 20:36

    BBC Radio 4 reporter Simon Cox on File on 4: "We have found evidence that it’s still happening today. We got in touch with a former Spanish player who trains players and is currently down under at the Australian Open. Our investigation has established that eight players competing at the tournament have been repeatedly flagged to the tennis integrity unit."

  6. Postpublished at 20:33

    BBC Radio 4 reporter Simon Cox on File on 4: "You have probably been trying to guess the names - Roger Federer has said we should name the players but along with BuzzFeed News we have decided not to because without access to their phone, bank and computer records it is not possible to determine if they have been taking part in match fixing.

    "But tennis` integrity unit knows the names because the warnings have been passed directly to them from numerous bodies."

  7. Postpublished at 20:32

    Quote Message

    Sometimes they were talking like in the next locker about some things, I mean it’s like so many guys did it though. It was well known, it was like an open secret.

    Daniel Koellerer, Former player

  8. Postpublished at 20:30

    Quote Message

    When I was on tour I know I could tell you easily five, six names which I know 100% that they were losing matches on purpose.

    Daniel Koellerer, Former player

  9. Postpublished at 20:27

    Chris Kermode, chief executive of the ATP, on the size of the integrity unit:"There was a judgement call made.  And I think it’s about the effectiveness of the tennis integrity unit, it’s not just about the numbers of people who work in one building, it’s actually the reach that they have.  And the fact that they’ve the tennis integrity unit has connections with betting companies globally to get betting data and also, with local law enforcement agencies around the world, so the reach is actually huge."

  10. Postpublished at 20:26

    Quote Message

    They chose a lesser option. It was going to be more difficult to actually address the concerns they had and certainly as far as a lack of betting intelligence and expertise within the unit, they were trying to do it, in my mind with one hand tied behind their back.

    Ben Gunn

  11. Postpublished at 20:25

    BBC Radio reporter Simon Cox: "Ben Gunn recommended tennis set up a well resourced integrity team to investigate corruption of up to six investigators, including a betting analyst who could spot suspicious gambling. 

    "Instead when in 2008 tennis did set up its own integrity unit it went for a small unit of two former senior police officers. This, says Ben Gunn, was a mistake…"

  12. Postpublished at 20:23 Greenwich Mean Time 19 January 2016

    Quote Message

    "We said to tennis that we thought they were at a crossroads. We felt that there were suspicious games. That had gone back a number of years. We weren't actually sure that they'd investigated those games correctly and that was probably because they didn't have the structure the systems and the processes to do it. And that was really the nub of the review to actually recommend to them what resources they needed.

    Ben Gunn

  13. Postpublished at 20:21

    Separate to the Sopot enquiry - Tennis had commissioned a major inquiry into betting in tennis in 2008 lead by a former police chief constable Ben Gunn. 

    His team interviewed players, officials and went to tournaments around the world. 

    Ben Gunn is another insider who has never talked before about the enquiry he conducted, but has decided to now.

  14. Postpublished at 20:20

    BBC Radio 4 reporter Simon Cox: "Mark Phillips and the other investigators passed their findings to the ATP and to their anti-corruption body. 

    "They decided it wasn’t strong enough to act upon and opened no new investigations into the players, prompting accusations they sat on the evidence. 

    "Chris Kermode, chief executive of the ATP, denies that’s the case."

  15. Postpublished at 20:19 Greenwich Mean Time 19 January 2016

    Quote Message

    "There were many many matches in there that were you know almost as suspicious as the Davydenko match. You would have one player who would win a set and then they would go a break of serve up and then almost as soon as that happened there would just be a flood of money for the other player who would then miraculously win eight games in a row or something like that was the main pattern of the 45 matches."

    Mark Phillips, Investigator

  16. Postpublished at 20:16

    BBC Radio 4 reporter Simon Cox: "There was a second Sicilian group who had bet on 12 suspicious matches and made over £650,000 profit. The analysis of Mark Phillips said the betting on some of the matches was completely farcical and obvious to anyone with any betting experience that the result was almost certainly a foregone conclusion.

    "The third syndicate was in Northern Italy and had bet on 21 suspicious matches again making over £650,000 pounds profit. Mark Phillips' conclusion about this syndicate was explosive. He wrote that the way that the gamblers bet on these matches "would strongly suggest that both players in the match are involved in the conspiracy”.  

  17. Postpublished at 20:14

    BBC Radio 4 reporter Simon Cox: "What had interested me most wasn`t the enquiry but where it led the investigators. The files we have obtained reveal for the first time how the enquiry identified three syndicates making hundreds of thousands of pounds betting on suspicious matches.

    "The first based in Russia had bet on five suspicious games and made over 250 pounds profit. In the documents passed to us, the betting investigator Mark Phillips wrote: “There is no doubt in my mind these accounts are in receipt of inside information, at the very least, regarding Russian players."

  18. Postpublished at 20:10

    Richard Ings: "In talking to players about it, it became very clear that players also believed that there was match fixing which was potentially going on in the in the sport of men's pro tennis there were players who came forward to me acknowledging that in certain situations they had been approached and offered money to throw matches and it wasn't one player or two players it was it was a regular thing within the sport."

  19. Postpublished at 20:09

    BBC Radio 4 report Simon Cox: "In 2003 Richard Ings was a senior executive at the ATP, this was a time when you start betting on players to lose as well as win. That meant a player could fix a match without his opponent knowing, so Richard Ings decided to investigate match-fixing in tennis."

  20. Postpublished at 20:09

    Betfair's Mark Davies: "We had a management meeting to decide whether there were some players that we should stop covering bets full stop covering their matches and only one person in that meeting dissented from that view.

    "There was probably a list of six or seven players, honestly I don't remember but it was sufficient that we should call a management meeting and that we should say look we we've had a big problem where we've effectively got out of jail ourselves on Thursday and we don't want that problem to recur again. 

    "This wasn't something completely out of the blue for us, this was something we had been watching build."