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Another match-fixing investigation rocks Korean Basketball League

May 25, 2015

The Korean Basketball League has been hit with its second match-fixing investigation involving a head coach in two years. (Yonhap)

SEOUL (Yonhap) — Police said they’re investigating an active professional basketball coach over match-fixing allegations.

Seoul police said the coach, whose identity is being withheld, allegedly bet against his own team in the Korean Basketball League (KBL) and inserted bench players in the second half to ensure the team would lose.

Police added that they’ve detained two acquaintances of the coach’s for allegedly making illegal wagers on KBL games for the coach. Police believe the coach borrowed 300 million won (US$273,000) from a loan shark to bet on games. They are also trying to track down two other friends of the coach’s who helped him borrow the money.

The KBL was hit with a major match-fixing scandal in 2013, when Dongbu Promy head coach Kang Dong-hee became the first from a major domestic sports league to be sentenced for throwing games. He was sentenced to 10 months in jail, and the KBL later banned him for life

Baseball, volleyball, football and even taekwondo have recently dealt with their own match-fixing scandals, with active and former players indicted or convicted for their roles.

The only legal form of sports betting in South Korea is through purchasing Sports Toto lottery tickets. Sports Toto offers odds on wins, ties, losses and final scores. A bettor can only wager up to 100,000 won (about $90) per ticket, up to six times a day.

Illegal sports gambling sites often offer “proposition bets,” or simply prop bets. They place odds on seemingly inconsequential stats, such as the number of free throws made in the opening quarter of a basketball game, and there is usually no cap on the amount of wager.

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*Various media outlets have since identified the suspect as Jun Chang-jin, 52, the head coach of the Anyang KGC (Korean Ginseng Corporation).