Police constable among 14 facing life ban for match-fixing in Goan football

Panaji: Fourteen players and officials, which includes a police constable Mouzzan Shaikh attached with the Goa Police football team, are on the brink of facing suspensions and even life bans for their alleged roles in match-fixing in Goa Professional League.
In his preliminary report, Goa Football Association’s integrity officer and retired deputy superintendent of police Sandesh Chodankar has said “there is ample evidence of match-fixing”.
“All 14 players/officials have violated multiple provisions of the GFA Ethics Code 2021,” Chodankar said in the 288-page chargesheet, which was handed over to the players on Friday, most of whom are from Chapora. They’ve been given 10 days to reply to the charges.
“The players knowingly and deliberately engaged themselves in match-fixing and underperforming to influence result,” Chodankar said in his investigation report, which was conducted after the football club, Chapora Yuvak Sangh, filed a complaint with the GFA in October.
Chapora president Pravin Dabholkar had filed a complaint that nine of the club’s players — Akash Kudnekar, Krishnanath Shirodkar, Sachidanand Satelkar, Bhaskar Jalmi, Aman Govekar, Chaitan Dabholkar, Rohan Pednekar, Vinayak Rane and Akash Sanadi — were involved in “match-fixing for monetary benefits”. All of them had met a suspected match fixer— only identified as ‘masked man’ Sandy, arriving in a tinted car — a day before their Goa Professional League (GPL) clash against Clube de Salgaocar, where they were offered money to lose the game by three goals.
Chapora lost 2-1. Goalkeeper Bhaskar Jalmi’s role in conceding two goals in the first half raised eyebrows and forced coach Anthony Levino Pereira to substitute him at half time.
According to official statements seen by TOI, Jalmi tackled the opponent inside the danger zone, which could have resulted in a penalty but eventually ended with a goal-line clearance, while another player “deliberately scored an own goal” only for the referee to award an offside.
“I reviewed all matches after the disclosure of match-fixing incident by watching the video recording and noticed that the players committed deliberate acts like goalkeeper conceding easy goals, defenders not playing as per plan and strikers, when they get a chance, not converting the opportunity into goals,” coach Pereira, a former India defender, said in his voluntary statement. “I expected the team to win against Vasco, but players underperformed (in 1-0 loss). Against Churchill Brothers, we conceded three goals within the first 15-20 minutes and drew 2-2 against Bidesh XI due to under performance of the goalkeeper.”
GFA said the presence of all those charged of match-fixing has been established at two separate meetings with the fixer: First at Old Goa jetty and later behind the Old Goa police station. Two witnesses who saw the Chapora players and reported it to the club president have also provided their statements.
Players from Calangute Association — Suraj Hadkonkar, Ronaldo Oliveira — and Minesh Kunkolkar of Pax of Nagoa were also present for the meetings.
The GFA integrity officer made a special mention of Shaikh and asked GFA to inform Goa Police “regarding the conduct of police constable Mouzzan Shaikh about his role in match-fixing, so that discipline of the police force is maintained”.
“In order to find out the consideration paid for fixing the match, this can only be investigated by lodging an FIR with police who can check their financial dealings. The integrity officer of GFA cannot investigate certain incidents like the identity of the alleged masked man due to non-cooperation of the players involved, despite having the mobile number of the masked man.
“GFA must file a police complaint requesting to register FIR and conduct detailed investigation to unearth rampant match-fixing, so that the authority of GFA is not undermined by anybody,” said Chodankar.
For the past six years, international betting monitors like Sportradar and Genius Sports have told GFA about suspicious betting patterns in Goa Professional League which are indicative of match-fixing.