Tennis Match-Fixing Probe Clears Players

ENLARGE

David Marrero, far right, with doubles partner Pablo Carreño Busta, in action during this year’s French Open. Photo: Julian Finney/Getty Images

PARIS—At this year’s Australian Open, four little-known tennis pros found themselves in the middle of an international sports controversy over rumors about match fixing. After an investigation, tennis officials have cleared the players.

The Tennis Integrity Unit, which investigates allegations of corruption in tennis, confirmed the findings of its investigation after one of the players, David Marrero of Spain, told the Journal that he had been exonerated.

“While details of the investigation will remain confidential, no evidence of corrupt activity has been identified and no further action will be taken against any player involved,” said Mark Harrison, a spokesman for the TIU, in a statement to the Journal.

The four players received world-wide attention after a report in the New York Times about a gambling company, Pinnacle Sports, that claimed to have identified suspicious betting patterns on the players’ mixed-doubles match. The company suspended betting on the match before it began. Marco Blume, head of sportsbook at Pinnacle, told the Times that an influx of money bet by a small number of people on one side—Marrero’s opponents—“was an indication that the match might be fixed.” Blume and two other Pinnacle representatives didn’t respond to requests for interviews and comment.

Mixed doubles is a low-visibility component of Grand Slam tournaments that pits teams with one woman and one man against each other. Marrero and his partner, Lara Arruabarrena, also of Spain, lost to Poland’s Lukasz Kubot and the Czech Republic’s Andrea Hlavackova. Marrero, playing with a wrap below his knee, hobbled between points and missed several routine shots. He said he was injured at the time. The final score was 6-0, 6-3.

Arruabarrena and Hlavackova declined to comment. Kubot couldn’t be reached to comment. All of the players immediately denied any involvement in match fixing at the time.

“I knew I hadn’t done anything so I would be fine,” Marrero told the Journal this weekend in Paris, where he was competing in men’s doubles at the French Open. “I’m very happy now that everything is over.”

Marrero said that investigators examined his phone, as well as the phones of the other three players in the match. “They got in touch with me and we did the whole procedure,” he said.

Marrero said that before he traveled to Paris, he checked in with the TIU.

“They told me that everything was fine, that I shouldn’t worry about anything,” he said. At the French Open, Marrero played men’s doubles with partner Pablo Carreño Busta. They retired in their second-round match because of an injury to Carreño Busta.

Harrison, from the TIU, added: “TIU investigations not only root out corrupt practices, but also support players who are the subject of unproven speculation.” He declined to comment on the extent or methods of the TIU’s investigation.

Gambling was the talk of the Australian Open, after an investigation by BuzzFeed and the BBC cited data that suggested ongoing irregularities in betting on tennis matches. TIU and high-ranking tennis officials pointed out at the time that irregular betting patterns don’t necessarily mean gambling is involved, and said they thoroughly investigate suspicious incidents. TIU investigations have led to sanctions for 17 players, three officials and a player’s manager since the unit was created in 2008. Many of the sanctions were for match-fixing and gambling on tennis. Five players and one official have been banned for life. The sanctions have uniformly involved lower-ranked players, not superstars, and have largely stemmed from incidents at small events.

During the Australian Open, Pinnacle responded to inquiries from the Journal with a statement. “As a precaution, betting on this match was suspended due to unusual betting activity,” the statement said. “It is not our place to draw any conclusion about the individuals or the circumstances.”

An analysis by the Journal at the time of the incident found that Pinnacle had offered more favorable odds than other gambling websites for gamblers who wanted to bet on Kubot and Hlavackova to win.

Marrero immediately denied any role in match fixing. The defeat was his 10th consecutive loss in mixed doubles, a little known statistic at the time that, in the hands of a wise gambler, could have been reason enough to bet against Marrero and Arruabarrena. Marrero said he was stunned by the report and the subsequent investigation.

“I was very surprised, because I never thought this would happen to me,” he said.

Because of the media attention on gambling during the Australian Open, tennis authorities commissioned a review of the sport’s anticorruption programs by an outside panel. The TIU also recently began releasing quarterly reports about matches that have been flagged as potentially suspicious by gambling companies.

In its first report, in April, the TIU said it received 48 alerts for matches played between January and March of this year. In that period, more than 24,000 tennis matches were played around the world at various professional levels, including Grand Slam tournaments, regular tour events, and lower-level events where up-and-coming pros try to earn ranking points. One of the 48—the mixed-doubles match at the Australian Open—was at a Grand Slam tournament. One was on the main WTA tour. The rest were low-level men’s and women’s events. The TIU said 246 matches were flagged by gambling companies in 2015.

“There are many reasons other than corrupt activity that can explain unusual patterns,” Harrison said in his statement. He cited incorrect odds-setting, player fitness, playing conditions and personal circumstances as among the possibilities.

Marrero didn’t enter the mixed-doubles tournament at the French Open. Asked why, he said, “My ranking is no good.”

—Joshua Robinson contributed to this article.