Belgian soccer club Sint Truiden has recently started an exhaustive investigation after having noticed an unusual interest from the part of bettors in their club. The amounts of money staked on their matches seemed to Sint Truiden at least suspicious. The Belgian soccer federation admitted they knew about this matter but rather stay away from prosecution and leave it up to the club. In Germany or Brazil match-fixing has shaken local leagues and made many games and players look suspicious.
As the local newspaper Morgen reported, at the internet sportsbook Betfair, over 840.000 dollars were staked on the match played between Sint Truiden and La Louviere, last October. La Louviere won 3-1. Even the most prestigious club in the country that usually wins the League and plays Champions League never had so much money staked on them. Actually, Morgen reports that the amount bettors wagered for Sint Truiden at Betfair is around 20 times more than any amount of bets staked on Anderlecht. Then again, when Sint Truiden played against Cercle Brugge, the money wagered reached 322,790 dollars for Sint Truiden to lose, and Sint Truiden lost 2-1.
Therefore, Sint Truiden suspects of players having fixed the match. Roland Duchatelet, club chairman, said that after knowing about the amount staked, they immediately went to to see what had happened. They interviewed players after the match and watched the game again, but they could not find any proof of their players involvement in match-fixing. Nevertheless, Mr Duchatelet made his players sign a declaration where they committed not to bet on the clubs games nor give any confidential information about the team. The club chairman has informed the police and they will be following the issue closely.