Betting agencies are calling for a new organisation much like the World Anti-Doping Agency, to be established so that governments and sports federations can cooperate across borders to investigate betting irregularities and put an end to match fixing.

Yesterday an independent election committee elected the new chairman of the Polish Football Association PZPN. The election followed a turbulent month of battles between FIFA, UEFA and the Polish government, threats of disqualification and corruption charges in the Polish world of football.

Long held suspicions of match-fixing in Bulgarian football materialised in the arrest of Bulgarian Ivan Lekov, vice chairman of the State Agency for Sport and Youth and member of the Executive Commission of the Bulgarian Football Union (BFU). This happened after a group of former referees went public about experienced bribes and match-fixings conducted by top positioned deputies in the BFU.

Many regulars at Play the Game conferences have been left amazed and outraged in equal measure by the research carried out by Canadian investigative journalist and academic Declan Hill, who has devoted years to researching the dangerous underworld that lies behind much of professional sport. Now, Hill has compiled his latest research into one book – The Fix.

The Court of Arbitration for Sport’s ruling on the dispute between the International Handball Federation and the Asian Handball Federation over Asian qualification tournaments for the Beijing Olympics highlights a catalogue of failings by both organisations. John Ryan of teamhandballnews.com analyses the findings.

In March this year, a Swiss court produced evidence that in the period from 1989 to 2001, the now defunct International Sport and Leisure company (ISL) paid officials from a number of sports federations 87.5 million euros to obtain profitable broadcasting rights. Yet, when the court’s verdict was published last week, six former ISL executives indicted in the case were cleared of most of the charges against them.

Malcolm Speed has been placed on ‘gardening leave’ for his remaining two months as chief executive of the International Cricket Council. His position became untenable after infighting within the organisation over how to proceed following an independent ICC audit of Zimbabwe Cricket found “severe financial irregularities” within the organisation.

Former Trinidad and Tobago national goalkeeper and 2006 World Cup star Shaka Hislop expressed relief at the judgment from the Sports Dispute Resolution Panel (SDRP), which, he felt, justified the players’ decision to seek legal action in their bonus dispute with the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation (TTFF).