A new spot-fixing scandal has emerged in the build-up to this month’s 48-team North America tournament.
FIFA World Cup 2026, being played across Canada, Mexico and the United States of America, has been hit with early controversy before the kick of a football.
An investigation claims to have uncovered corruption across sport on every continent, including some of the world’s largest events both within the game of football and in other sports.
Two offences, one alleged to have occurred mere weeks ago
According to a report from Jacob Whitehead of The Athletic, two players heading to World Cup 2026 are embroiled in a new spot-fixing scandal.
Each player has been reported to the national federations of where they play club football by independent integrity experts over spot-fixing suspicions.
Both players are alleged to have deliberately received yellow cards in matches played within the last year, but are now heading to North America to compete in football’s most prestigious tournament.
One of those offences is also believed to have occurred weeks ago, revealing possible recent activity as opposed to older offences at lower levels of the game.
Earlier this season, a player is alleged to have deliberately received a yellow card during a league fixture to ensure they served a suspension prior to an upcoming derby, thus guaranteeing their availability.
The scheme was reportedly concocted and discussed far enough in advance to cause a bizarrely high level of stakes on said player being booked, causing the match to be flagged by monitoring systems.
The other case occurred last month when a similar alert was triggered - two separate bookmakers reported suspicious betting activity.
The bets in question were placed on a player receiving a first-half yellow card, which came to fruition after the footballer in question committed three fouls in under five first-half minutes.
Neither of the players involved were named in the report, so as to not compromise any active investigations into the alleged offences.
When asked if match-fixing had been discussed in advance of the World Cup 2026, FIFA responded: “FIFA has a zero tolerance policy against match manipulation and provides a dedicated, highly secure and web-based whistleblowing system so that any individuals can report any form of knowledge of potential match manipulation or integrity-related misconduct."
