For me it's the murk and silence around the issue of corruption that stands out
Football is a big money business. Has been for decades. That undoubtedly attracts people who want to profit from it. Attempts must have been made to divert the course of a game, decisions, free kicks, corners and the big stuff like the actual result and red cards.
But, beyond the premier leagues general statement on endeavouring to stand against corruption, both the premier league and fa are so incredibly silent on this issue that they'd have you believe it is not a problem and they never encounter it.
If that it so, what practices do they have in place to check? They won't say. Do they have a whistleblower programme? Have the successfully thwarted attempts on the past? Do they talk about new threats and precautions?
At the end of the day it's an organisation that governs and effectively audits itself. Its inevitable that at some point somebody within that circle has stood to personally profit from a situation. Actually if you look into the FA's history it's a damning fact that it happened repeatedly from the 19th century, and people in those positions now all know each other very, very well. It's likely that at least on one occasion they went through with it in the premier league era too.
This is before we even look at the evidence on the pitch, the off decisions, quick rule changes, lack of var TV screens in certain circumstances. Or the frankly morally bankrupt comments from scudamore a few years back about it being their job to ensure a new winner every few years. Competitiveness yes absolutely. But winners? How are you going to actually do that if a team or selected teams are consistently better than each other? Was it a policy when United, arsenal and Chelsea were the winners year after year?
But let's not just look at the English leagues. Italy is know for it, others too, and if our league is supposedly the best and most money generating in the world, surely we'd be a target too? Look at uefa changing the rules on how money is split, so even if Liverpool or United fail to qualify for Europe for a decade, they still get payments from uefa from their competition profits because of their 'historical importance' to their competitions. The same ones they tried to jump ship and abandon for a bigger offer in the super league, by the way. These guys are money men, approach them with a way to make more money that requires somebody to be leant on or cut in to turn a blind eye, it's not a problem if the risk is acceptable and the profit worthwhile.
Managing the game is the term I believe, and I also believe there are many fingers in the pie. Not just the referees, it's a strategy from the top. I also believe that much of the anger an opposition to City has been precisely because our rise means one of the jolly fat pigs loses out
