If we crowned the worst enemy of tennis it would be – match-fixing. Paying someone to lose a match takes away all the enjoyment that comes from watching a sport. Ukrainian tennis player Sergiy Stakhovsky has just spoken about some match-fixing that took place at the 2009 Australian Open.

What Did Sergiy Stakhovsky Say?

In an interview with Ukrainian television, Sergiy Stakhovsky revealed that he had been offered $100,000 to lose his first-round match against Arnaud Clement. He declined the offer and went straight to the Tennis Integrity Unit(TIU) to report the incident.

At the TIU, they asked him the names of the people who made the offer. Sergiy did not give them the names because he wanted his family to be safe. The man who gave him the offer was an intermediary and there were many dangerous people above him. I think we can certainly understand Sergiy’s reason for not revealing the names.

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Sergiy Stakhovsky went on to lose the match but at least the match was an entertaining one. It was a 5-setter with both players battling it out till the very end. It was a match that became an entertaining one in contrast to a boring one which it would have become had Sergiy taken the money.

Tennis is about battles fought till the very end on-court. People still remember the 2008 Wimbledon Final because it was an amazing battle that was fought until the very end by both Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer. If either of them took money to lose, do you think we would still remember the match today?

That is the reason why there should be no match-fixing. By match-fixing, tennis fans are being robbed of the possible entertainment that comes from watching hard-fought battles. This is something that should not happen and I hope nobody tries to do it ever.