Whether motivated by the glory of victory, the fear of defeat or simple monetary greed, regrettably there will always be those who cheat at sport.
And when cheating takes place in high-profile events -- whether it be the use of a joke-shop blood capsule to fabricate an injury at a key moment in a rugby match, deliberately crashing a Formula 1 car into a wall at great speed to contrive victory for a teammate, or cricketers bowling no balls to order -- the resulting scandals make great media stories and provide compelling bar-room chat for fans.
But the potential damage done to the fabric of sport is massive because sport’s appeal derives from uncertainty of outcome: spectators engrossed in the action believing that the only factors separating the participants are sporting skills, fitness, strength, tactics and, on occasion, luck.

No immunity

Cheating can take many forms, but arguably it is cheating to lose –either contriving the result of an event, or just a specific aspect of the event -- that represents the most insidious threat to the reputation of sport. And no event is immune from the threat. Indeed, Jacques Rogge, President of the International Olympic Committee, and, Hugh Robertson, UK Minister for Sport, have recently said that they consider ‘fixing’ to have overtaken doping as the primary threat to the integrity of this summer’s London Olympics.
It’s not difficult to see why; every session of every discipline of every sport at this summer’s Olympic Games will be viewed by a huge global television audience, with bookmakers offering seemingly limitless bets on the minutiae of each event in-play, and betting exchanges such as Betfair and Betdaq offering individuals the option to ‘lay’ bets (namely, to bet on a participant to lose).
There will be clear opportunities to make money if a punter knows something that others do not. And the fact that the betting markets in many parts of the world, such as the US, south Asia and the Far East, are largely illegal (and therefore unregulated) means that the risk of detection for fixers operating in those jurisdictions is low.
One additional factor that makes the Olympics particularly susceptible to fixing is that many of the Games’ events are effectively contested by amateurs, with no prize money or appearance money on offer. That may not matter to those athletes who are well-funded year round by national governing bodies and numerous sponsors, but it might be relevant for other athletes in other events, where the financial rewards are less significant. Recent experience shows that it does not take large wads of cash to persuade sportsmen to engage in corrupt activity. In a recent trial in London, it emerged that professional cricketer Mervyn Westfield agreed to attempt to fix certain aspects of a match for his club for only £6,000.

Codes of conduct

What are the organisers and governing bodies doing to ensure that this summer’s Olympics remain free from corruption? Peers in the UK’s House of Lords recently discussed several initiatives put in place by organisers and governing bodies. Lord Moynihan, chairman of the British Olympic Association, said the BOA has ‘embarked on … far reaching educational programmes and embedded codes of conduct to be signed by every athlete selected to participate in the British team.’
In addition, for the first time each participant this summer will be bound by an IOC code of ethics that contains comprehensive rules concerning betting and fixing, and the committee will be provided with information on suspicious betting patterns by Betfair, pursuant to a recently-concluded memorandum of understanding between the two organisations.
A joint assessment unit has also been established by the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and its sports integrity advisor, the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Lord Condon, to monitor the corruption threat. That unit will comprise staff from LOCOG, the UK Gambling Commission, the Metropolitan Police, the UK Border Agency and the IOC Ethics Commission, and will meet every day during the Games to ‘gather, share and assess all the relevant information and patterns on fixing and gambling coming in from whatever source: betting agencies, police agencies or the Gambling Commission.’

Sting operations

Will those measures be sufficient to catch those who are intent on cheating? Maybe, but history suggests that corruption in sport is difficult to detect and punish. Examples of recently successful prosecutions for fixing indicate that, while intelligence of the sort to be obtained by the joint unit is useful in building a case, often it is not enough on its own, and evidence obtained through sting operations (as in the case of the Pakistani cricketers, Butt, Amir and Asif) or from whistleblowers (in Westfield) is required.
Nevertheless, as stated by Lord Moynihan in the recent House of Lords debate: ‘The system for the London 2012 Games exceeds any which has been seen before at a multisport event.’ Organisers and sponsors will certainly be hoping that it’s sufficient to keep this summer’s Games free from scandal.

Max Duthie is a partner and Jamie Herbert an associate the sports group at London based international law firm Bird & Bird. They have acted in several recent high-profile cases, including the ICC’s prosecution of three Pakistani cricketers