Issuing its annual report, the GLMS has revealed that the most prominent sport to appear in the list of suspicious betting alerts was football.
Football alerts originated mainly from Europe, with 359 coming from the continent, compared to South America where 61 alerts were reported and Asia which accounted for 40 alerts.
In total, of the 631 alerts that were made in 2018, 466 came from before the match start while 45 alerts were based on in-play odds changes. 120 alerts were triggered when matches had reached their conclusion.
football received the most suspicious betting alerts in 2018, with 482 of 631 alerts coming from the sport, of which, 46 matches were reported to UEFA and 18 matches were reported to FIFA.
Ludovico Calvi GLMS President issued the following update: “2018 has been for GLMS a wonderful and dynamic integrity journey. We started enthusiastically with the process of
globalisation of our monitoring and intelligence operations, through the launch of a new hub in Hong Kong and the development of a new intelligence and messaging platform.
“We went on by constantly enhancing the value of our operations – adding new features to the platforms including new markets and sports – as well as our service to our partners and members, by providing – beyond our regular alerts and reports – detailed analysis on matches upon request.
“The addition of 4 new members within 2018, strengthened our global integrity alliance and further leverage the “glocal” dimension of our operations, while we have tremendously increased the number of our monitoring partners, which includes important public and private stakeholders, coming from different fields.”
Underlining the importance of remaining active in a wide range of integrity initiatives, he continued: “The fight against sport competition manipulations is not only about monitoring and this is why we have been extremely active in other integrity segments, such as education and prevention. We have launched our education and prevention program, providing our members with relevant tools which can used at national and international level.
“During 2018 we have also been leading relevant policy discussions with legislators and policy makers. We have been notably advocating for a prompt entry into force of
the Council of Europe Convention on the Manipulations of Sport Competitions, which we consider as the world’s most complete, legal tool for the overall fight against sport
corruption. The convention also support and sponsor well regulated sports betting environments complemented by measures against illegal sports betting.”
Looking ahead, he concluded: “2019 has already started very dynamically for us. Rest assured that we will build on the foundations set in 2018 and making our best efforts for the benefit of sport and our members and in the highest interest of society.”
The topic of integrity will be prominent at the upcoming Betting on Football Conference, which runs from the 19th to the 22nd of March, Ludovico Calvi will be speaking on Thursday the 21st of March, analysing what is the best model for identifying and preventing match fixing, as well as how sporting bodies are protecting themselves. To find out more about the Conference, click here.