Let’s save the league from the gamblers!
It is beginning to emerge that betting syndicates operating locally and internationally are deciding the outcomes of football league results in Ghana.
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We are stunned by what we are hearing that our national football league is gradually being taken over by gamblers who are fixing matches.
And for most of these people and their local and international agents, the Ghana premier league has become an attraction because of the windfall they are reaping while the football season runs.
We have no proof, nor can sources at the Ghana Football Association verify, but it is widely rumoured that gamblers in Ghana, South Africa, China, Malaysia and other places made huge gains from the results of the last two matches of the first round.
Indeed, results of some particular matches have been cited as shocking, as they followed predictions made ahead of those matches.
Meanwhile, the Graphic Sport has no reason to believe that the suspected results were actually predetermined.
But the suspicions seem to be gaining some foothold, as we gather that the world football governing body, FIFA, has alerted the GFA to the potential danger posed by the alleged gambling activities to the development of Ghana football.
And we think FIFA’s warning must be timely, much as the GFA would not hesitate to make its members appreciate the need to eschew such negative tendencies to maintain the good name of Ghana football.
We also gather that some betting companies in South Africa, which are being done in by the hideous activities of the underground syndicates and who lost big time following the alleged results-fixing in the Ghana league, have also written to draw the GFA’s attention.
With such complaints coming from all directions, there is reason to believe that something untoward must be happening in our league.
It may no longer be coincidence when predicted results played out as exactly as we had some of them in the last matches of the first round of the premier league.
Therefore, it behoves the GFA, the PLB, as well as GHALCA and all other stakeholders in Ghana football, to close their ranks in an effort to stave off the activities of the gamblers.
Let us watch out, especially in the second round when the stakes will even be higher.