Arrests in football corruption investigation

It came as no surprise to readers of Football Is Fixed when Willie McKay, Harry Redknapp, Milan Mandaric and Amdy Faye were arrested yesterday as part of ongoing investigations into footballing fraud. Back in July I posted on another football forum that there was a common link between many of the transfers which were not cleared by the Lord Stevens inquiry:

"I think the obvious connection in all of this is a certain football agent who I will not name, but I'm sure you'll understand who I mean.

He was the agent of:
Player B who transferred from Auxerre to Rangers
Player B then transferred from Rangers to Newcastle
Player F who transferred from Auxerre to Portsmouth
Player F then transferred from Portsmouth to Newcastle
Player M who transferred from Auxerre to Portsmouth"

"Player F" was a reference to Faye (who later moved to Rangers on loan), and the agent I was referring to was Willie McKay, of course. You'll have to work out the identity of players (JA)B and (B)M yourself, but unfortunately one of them is no longer under the jurisdiction of British police. Harry Redknapp had the finger pointed at him by the BBC Panorama programme, and frankly it's a wonder he's still in his job after these developments.

Of course all of these people are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law (as are current Portsmouth chairman Alexandre Gaydamak, super agent Pini Zahavi, Kia Jorrabichian, Sam Allardyce, Eggert Magnusson, Malcolm Glazer, Gillett and Hicks, and lots of other innocent people)... but if they are guilty of impropriety they'd better get the book thrown at them. You might think that lifetime bans from football would be an obvious non-criminal penalty but that isn't what the Italians think, so who knows! Also, as a Rangers fan myself, I'm very concerned that we have got involved with this agent, with Faye (who's shite anyway), and with that other possibly-dodgy transfer triangle with Auxerre and Newcastle. We await developments with interest. In the meantime, keep an eye on Football Is Fixed for the latest.