EU Athletes took part in the first steering meeting for the new project coordinated by the University of Nicosia – Combating Match Fixing in Club Football Non-Competitive Matches, at the European Office of Cyprus on Thursday, 28 March. This ongoing project is co-funded by the European Union through the Erasmus+ Program.
The project started this year and will conclude in December 2021, aiming to act upon a growing body of evidence of match-fixing in non-competitive matches at the lower level of the professional club game. There is a genuine need for the issue of fixing in non-competitive football matches to be the subject of serious analysis and for solutions in terms of governance reform and educational tools to be developed to combat the problem.
The project will address these issues by researching and investigating the level of the problem, developing governance and organizational solutions at a pan-European level and educational tools for key targets, notably players, clubs and national associations. The project will benefit other sports at a pan-European level as the findings and solutions developed for football can have significant areas in common with other sports.
EU Athletes, alongside footballers’ unions from Cyprus, Greece and Malta, will provide insight into instances of suspicious approaches of players in non-competitive matches. In addition, EU Athletes will provide support in developing educational tools to warn players and other stakeholders of the dangers posed by match fixers in non-competitive matches.
EU Athletes took part in the KCOOS+ 2018-2020, 2nd
Advisory meeting of Contributors and Associate Partners hosted by the Council
of Europe – Brussels Office on Friday, March 8th.
The Keep Crime Out Of Sport- “against manipulations of sports competitions” is a technical assistance project coordinated by the Council of Europe. KCOOS+ builds upon the previous EU-COE joint project KCOOS. Project KCOOS+ explores innovative approaches to combating the manipulation of sports competitions and accompany countries in the development of National Platforms, legislation and co-operation and coordination measures. It is worldwide project, therefore expanding the scope of expertise exchange and technical assistance, which will see the project run until December 2020.
The goal of the 2nd Advisory meeting
of Contributors and Associate Partners was to disseminate the overview of 2018
activities, assess relevant associate partners projects that can work in
coordination with KCOOS+ and the council of Europe and discuss the next steps
to the project for 2019.
EU Athletes, along with other relevant associate partner projects, presented its’ ongoing PROtect Integrity Plus Erasmus+ project to see where synergies and the possibilities of coordination with the KCOOS+ project could be found. EU Athletes who represents the perspective of professional and elite level sportspeople in Europe, believes that athletes are a part of the solution and their involvement is essential to combating the manipulation of sports competitions. Additionally, in possible coordination with KCOOS+, the PROtect Integrity project can foster national cooperation in a complementary way, coordinate actions and exchange relevant information regarding activities and developments in particular countries.
The next stages of the project will continue with expanding the scope of expertise exchange and technical assistance to various countries.
EU Athletes is a partner in the new EU-financed project under ERASMUS+, namely Integrisport ERASMUS+ which has its official launch on 30-31 January 2019 in The Hague, during the project’s first steering committee meeting. The meeting was hosted by The Dutch Ministry of Justice and Security, one of the beneficiary countries of the project and the operational schedule and relevant organisational matters were discussed and decided.
IntegriSport Erasmus+ will run from January 2019 until
December 2020 and aims to catalyze the efficiency of sport-manipulation-related
crime investigation and prosecution activities by providing awareness raising
on all aspects of the manipulation of sports competitions in Cyprus, Finland,
Hungary, Lithuania, The Netherlands, Portugal and Slovakia.
The
partnership is completed by: EU Athletes who represents the perspective of
professional and elite level sportspeople; GLMS, the sports
integrity body of the global lottery sector, which brings its expertise on betting and betting monitoring;
and Aix-Marseille University, which has a vital role in research
activities. Partner organisations in particular will add credibility to
the project by including their network and expertise.
Integrisport Erasmus+ was one of two projects regarding
fighting sport manipulation (match fixing) which was funded by the European
Union through Erasmus+ Sport in 2018 and is unique in its approach to targeting
notably law enforcement and the judiciary.
As the Partners of the Project agreed during the
meeting, Integrisport Erasmus+ will not only raise the awareness of law
enforcement and judicial authorities in the participant countries, but should also
establish a standard level of knowledge as a benchmark for law enforcement and
the judiciary in the field of tackling sports manipulations. These standards
would be able to be used globally henceforth in the fight against criminals in
this domain.
The Council of Europe, as the
organization with the only international, legally binding text in this domain
that notably criminalizes manipulations of sports competitions, through its
Convention on the Manipulation of Sports Competitions and its concept of
national platforms, in which law enforcement and the judiciary would and do
participate, welcomed the project and was also present at the meeting.
The organisation supports the
development of Integrisport through the Macolin Roadmap and creating synergies
with the KCOOS+ project.
Project Partners
Coordinator
Stichting CSCF – Counter Sport Corruption
Foundation for Sport Integrity
Partner Organisations
GLMS – The Global Lottery
Monitoring System
EU Athletes
Aix-Marseille University (Centre for Sports Law)
Supporting Organisation
Council of Europe (TMC and KCOOS+)
Country Partners:
Cyprus Police, Cyprus
Finnish
Center for Integrity in Sports (FINCIS), Finland
Rapid
Response and Special Police Force, Hungary
National
Tax and Customs Administration, Hungary
Ministry
of Justice and Security, the Netherlands
The
Department of Physical Education and Sports, Lithuania
Ministry of Justice – Judicial Police, Portugal
Presidium
of the Police Force, Ministry of Interior of the Slovak Republic
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EU Athletes Board met for the first time this year on the 23rd of January in Copenhagen. Discussions included exchanges about activities related to the European institutions and policy developments in areas such as player rights, anti-doping, match-fixing and others. New possibilities for organizing and cooperation were noted in basketball and volleyball, as well as strong involvement of EU Athletes in the Erasmus+ programme, as the organization is coordinating its PROtect Integrity Plus project while being a partner in four different projects.
Next meeting of the Board will take place in June 2019.
After one year since our Erasmus+ PROtect Integrity Plus project kicked off, project partners and staff met in Copenhagen on 22nd of January, the to asses the implementation of the project so far and discuss the upcoming actions.
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The aim of the project is to introduce the Red Button App, allowing athletes to report anything suspicious in relation to match-fixing, to 3000 professional and elite level athletes from 7 EU countries (UK, Ireland, France, Denmark, Greece, Italy, Spain) and 5 different sports (rugby, basketball, handball, volleyball, futsal). All the partner player associations have the reporting system set up, in partnership with National Platforms or other entities who are report receivers, and are rolling out the App to their players.
Next important steps of the project will include particularly the research led by prof. David Forrest from the University and the Dissemination Conference which will take place in October in Athens.
