DOES game-fixing exist in collegiate leagues?
One league insider is convinced that is possible, although it’s hard to prove.
“Mahirap i-prove iyan but I’m sure mayroon iyan sa lahat ng popular leagues,” the insider, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Malaya-Business Insight yesterday. “Basta big money iyan. Gambling syndicates are behind all that.”
Suspicions of game-fixing were raised anew after two teams — Siquijor and ARQ Builders-Lapu Lapu City — figured in a mockery of a match in the Visayas leg of the new pro league Chooks-to-Go Pilipinas VisMin Super Cup last April 14 at the Alcantara Civic Center in Cebu.
The source said money is the root of the existence of game-fixing and added authorities should crack the whip on the liable personalities.
“(Game-fixing in sports has) no place indeed but just like in any commerce, money dictates everything,” the insider said.
“I hope the government authorities crack down on this sports gambling and start putting perpetrators in jail.”
The UAAP and the NCAA, and even the PBA, are in limbo due to the lingering COVID-19 pandemic.
The fate of the Mindanao leg of the VisMin Cup remains hanging in the air, for now.
Despite the appeal for reconsideration of Chooks-to-Go president and sports patron Ronald Mascariñas, whose firm is sponsoring the league, Games and Amusements Board chairman Baham Mitra said the league is still under probe.
In a blatant mockery of the sport so dear to Filipinos, players muffed free throws and botched open lay-ups, with the Heroes’ Rendell Senining shooting free throws with his left and right hand on separate occasions, both of which he badly missed.
Mystics players Joshua Alcober, Ryan Buenafe, Jan Penaflor, Gene Bellaza, Michael Calomot, Frederick Rodriguez, Jopet Quiro, Isagani Gooc, Miguel Castellano, Juan Aspiras, Peter Buenafe, Vincent Tangcay, and Michael Sereno have been banished from the league, including their coach Joel Palapal and his staff.
Castellano and Sereno were later spared from sanctions since they were not present in the controversial match.
