A report compiled by Sportradar has advised that match-fixing in esports is lowering. The worldwide sports activities monitoring firm famous that 34 matches have been flagged as suspicious in 2025, down from 41 the earlier 12 months.
Matches with suspicions of match-fixing made up simply 0.03% of the 100,000 matches that Sportradar monitored final 12 months. That’s far lower than many different sports activities, with soccer having the best proportion of suspicious matches at 0.31%, adopted by basketball at 0.29%.
Esports had one of many lowest charges, together with desk tennis, at 0.03%. In its report, Sportradar famous, “The suspected match-fixing price throughout all sports activities decreased marginally—from one in each 608 matches in 2024 to at least one in each 709— and over 99.5% of worldwide sporting occasions remained free from suspicion.”
Picture supply: Esports World Cup Basis
Whereas esports skilled a decline within the variety of matches flagged, basketball, tennis, desk tennis, and cricket all noticed will increase. Sportradar mentioned, “This broadening of exercise highlights how match-fixing continues to develop throughout a wider vary of competitions and disciplines.”
There have been notable scandals within the NBA and NCAA basketball final 12 months, resulting in indictments in opposition to a number of gamers, coaches, and bettors.
Schooling Affect
Whereas noting the general decline in suspected match-fixing, Sportradar mentioned, “world match-fixing is turning into much less centralised however extra complicated.”
It added, “Improved enforcement and training are lowering incidents in established markets, whereas new patterns are uncovered in rising ones. Sustaining this momentum would require coordinated worldwide vigilance and innovation throughout all stakeholders and sports activities.”
The corporate has partnered with Riot Video games to ship education schemes to cut back match-fixing in esports. It companions with a spread of organizations throughout totally different sports activities, tailoring its packages to every sport’s distinctive integrity dangers.
It additionally collaborates with the Esports Integrity Fee (ESIC) to analyze any potential match-fixing circumstances. ESIC partnered with a number of new playing corporations to extend its monitoring of occasions, together with crypto casinos Rollbit and, most not too long ago, Stake.
Some Match-Fixing Instances From Final Yr
Sportradar mentioned there have been 9 recorded sanctions in esports. That matches up with the variety of gamers listed as sanctioned on ESIC’s website.
Three gamers have been handed lifetime bans, together with StarCraft II rivals Xue “Firefly” Tao and Jinhui “Jim” Cao. Their match-fixing dated again to 2024, when Jim allegedly paid Firefly to intentionally lose matches.
Different incidents from final 12 months embody the suspension of the Swedish CS2 crew Northern Lights. ESIC suspended all 5 members of the crew, with one participant admitting the aspect had engaged in match-fixing.
Frank “fraaank” Issal acknowledged, “We used to win/lose relying on what we had determined earlier than the match.”
ESIC additionally suspended Crew Senza (beforehand Rosy) over accusations of betting misconduct.
Affiliation With Match-Fixing Can Derail Careers
In one other case, Riot Video games suspended Valorant participant Seungmin “ban” Oh for partaking with people who proposed match manipulation.
This could not have been flagged in Sportradar’s report, because the participant in the end didn’t agree to repair any match. Nonetheless, Riot mentioned that merely entertaining proposals or partaking in discussions associated to match-fixing constitutes a breach of its guidelines.
In one other case, Counter-Strike Main finalist Nicholas “Keoz” Dgus accused his group kONO.ECF of fabricating match-fixing allegations to keep away from paying his wage.
The crew denied it deliberately withheld cost, however did ask the participant to take a polygraph check after accusations of match-fixing surfaced.
