Scandal ...again

[stephenj]

must stopp betting fiasco on games too ripe to rort

[Guest]

I have to admit that when Dave Smith mentioned this morning that there was one match they were looking at re match fixing, that Roosters/NQ game was the first one I thought of. I know it's not the Ryan Tandy one but to me there was something seriously wrong with our jeckel and hyde performance in that game. I know we haven't been consistent since that time but that performance still has big question marks alongside it in my eyes.

NC

SMH

IT WAS a fun day in Craig Fitzgibbon's honour - a horse race named after him at Randwick on the very day that Mrs Racing, Gai Waterhouse, was celebrating her birthday.


But by week's end the bonhomie had turned sour. The Roosters camp, tenuously fractured, is now bitterly, guttingly divided. The Roosters are battling accusations that they may have thrown the last game of the season. Players are pointing fingers. A small group of ''loose'' players, the clan that often visits brothels, has been ostracised. Their dropped balls and missed tackles may have gone too far.


One furious player told the Herald yesterday: ''I'd kill them myself [for destroying Fitzy's day]. That makes me sick. That's our life. If I find out it was some of my teammates threw it, there'll be trouble.'' Another suspected that a teammate was firmly involved. Players' future contracts are on the line.


But back to Wednesday, September 2. Most of the Roosters players attended the Randwick races in support of Fitzy and his stellar rugby league career. Outwardly it was a grand day of fun, fashion and frippery. Quite a few players had backed a horse called Fitness Fanatic, in recognition of Fitzgibbon's propensity for hard training, in race four, the Craig Fitzgibbon 3YO+ sprint over 1000 metres. But it ran second behind Jewel Colours.


By the last race, a few of the players and nearly all of the officials had left. Some elected to have ''staffies'' in a private room.


Less than 24 hours later the money started to roll in. Every man and his dog along the east coast wanted to back the
Roosters' rivals, the North Queensland Cowboys, to win by
13 points-plus. Friends of friends went to TAB outlets, laying out sums of money under the $10,000 reportable threshold. Typically, bets were $5000 or $7500.


The weight of money was so intense, the bookies started to get concerned. Was a key player injured? Why did everyone
believe the Roosters would lose by so much, especially when it was Fitzgibbon's last game with the club and the dreaded wooden spoon was at stake? The Roosters should have had everything to play for. Bizarrely no one wanted the shorter odds that they would lose head-to-head.
TAB Sportsbet suspended betting. Roosters insiders confirmed no one was injured, the team would take the field as listed. Betting reopened. But the game still had a smell about it.


Tab Sportsbet's Glenn Munsie said: ''The reason betting was suspended was the fact that whenever anyone wanted a bet of any decent nature [on the game], it was for the Cowboys to win by 13-plus. They didn't want to back them to win the game in the head to head, they didn't want to back them in the line market either. Do they want to take $5.85? They take $5.85. Now they want to take $5, now they want to take $4.50, now they want to take $4 … but hang on, why don't they want to back North Queensland to win the game? Why do they only want to attack this market?''


Munsie said the first bet rolled in at 7pm on the Thursday, followed by a ''steady stream''.


''It wasn't one or two people,'' he said. ''They were coming from all over the place. There were bets arriving from Queensland … agencies in Sydney. There were account customers backing them, all by 13-plus.


''We have blokes who have $50,000-$60,000 on teams every day. Nobody was betting that sort of money on this particular game. These bets ranged from $500 or $600 to $5000 or $6000.''


The news of the betting plunge was leaked. One insider claimed it was to try to stymie a fixed result. There had been similar concerns over other games, among them the Roosters' 44-12 loss to Manly.


Before the Cowboys game, the Roosters' mentor Phil Gould spoke about the importance of teamwork and how Fitzgibbon had been such a role model. With Gould's powerful words resonating in their ears, the Roosters started strongly. Sean Kenny-Dowall scooted down the sideline to score, followed soon after by the other Roosters winger, Iwi Hauraki.


Big Willie Mason backed up a blindside play and the score advanced to 16-0. The Roosters were on fire.


The Roosters camp had seen this before. Over the previous six weeks, the club had split into two: a coterie of players that appeared to play well for the first half, but then inexplicably their fitness failed and they started to make simple mistakes in the final 40 minutes.

The rest of team was initially annoyed, then increasingly bitter about this smaller group. They had suspicions, some well-founded. This group was loose, visiting the Camperdown brothel Stiletto on a regular basis, sometimes paying for the prostitutes, often not. Once, a group of players was picked up in a white stretch limousine on returning from playing the Melbourne Storm.


Said one player: ''I'm aware that several of the players have been up there [to Stiletto] on a weekly basis throughout the year. It's generally at the start of the week, during recovery.


''On occasions they are receiving free services. I don't know why or how that works. The majority of the players don't want to be associated with it.
I stay as far away as possible.''


On the Sunday after that final match of the season against the Cowboys - in which the Roosters let in 32 unanswered points after being ahead 16-0, fulfilling the bookies' nightmare of a payout - these players were at it again. Nothing like drowning their wooden spoon sorrows with a hooker or three. Even better, on that night they didn't have to pay.


Contacted by the Herald, Fitzgibbon, a former captain, could not countenance the game was possibly thrown.

''For what was my most special day of my career, if this was to be true, I'd be disgusted. If I find anyone in my team … I don't know what my actions would be. I find just the thought of it so disgusting. It didn't happen. It just didn't. It just couldn't have happened. The Cowboys were the better team on the day.''

But another player wasn't so sure. The second-half performance ''looked dodgy'' and, he acknowledged, it wasn't the first time during the season.
What of the match-fixing allegations? The player said: ''It's suspicious to me. It's a sh*t situation. I don't have the answers but neither do I want to be the one asking the questions.

''When I heard the rumours, I was stunned. I thought, this doesn't happen, does it? It can't be happening, not at my club. Now, looking back, I can't say that it didn't. There's one person that would do it.''


The NRL's director of communications, John Brady, said there had been no investigation into the match. ''We can't have an inquiry every time the bookie loses,'' he said. ''But if someone comes forward with some information then we look at it.''


Munsie said as an outsider, the Roosters' second-half performance ''did not look good,'' especially in light of the half-time lead and the game being Fitzgibbon's farewell.


''In the last couple of minutes, when you're down by 10, why are you throwing the ball around like you are the Harlem Globetrotters on your own line? Everything looked so lackadaisical, like they couldn't give a rat's. The fact that I was talking it up and it appeared in the paper that day, looks even worse.


''It's hard to believe you could write and publish a story like that and then, basically, it all comes true.''

[elo]

Our 09 season really is dodgy, the second halves just stank....I remember we all started blaming Freddo's half time white board but seriously who knows any more.

[Burnt Rooster]

Just watching the 10 ,news now, the refereeing and linesmans decisions in that game, have suddenly had the fog and mist lifted, from the 2010 Grandfinal.

[davos]

I know of one player who has been using roids for years such his superhuman strength -was out injured last yeaqr for a portion of the year to avoid the drug testers etc...This player from what I hear may be the first player to put his hand up

Initials S B ?

[Walshie's 9th Love Child]

I took 2 Panadol this morning looks like im Farked

[davos]

Our 09 season really is dodgy, the second halves just stank....I remember we all started blaming Freddo's half time white board but seriously who knows any more.

Only remember bits and pieces tbh. That was the year I tried to forget as much as possible and was to ashamed to say I was a chooks fan. I had to stop buying the paper, because everyday we were in it for all the wrong reasons.

[kurtsherlock6]

SMH

IT WAS a fun day in Craig Fitzgibbon's honour - a horse race named after him at Randwick on the very day that Mrs Racing, Gai Waterhouse, was celebrating her birthday.


But by week's end the bonhomie had turned sour. The Roosters camp, tenuously fractured, is now bitterly, guttingly divided. The Roosters are battling accusations that they may have thrown the last game of the season. Players are pointing fingers. A small group of ''loose'' players, the clan that often visits brothels, has been ostracised. Their dropped balls and missed tackles may have gone too far.


One furious player told the Herald yesterday: ''I'd kill them myself [for destroying Fitzy's day]. That makes me sick. That's our life. If I find out it was some of my teammates threw it, there'll be trouble.'' Another suspected that a teammate was firmly involved. Players' future contracts are on the line.


But back to Wednesday, September 2. Most of the Roosters players attended the Randwick races in support of Fitzy and his stellar rugby league career. Outwardly it was a grand day of fun, fashion and frippery. Quite a few players had backed a horse called Fitness Fanatic, in recognition of Fitzgibbon's propensity for hard training, in race four, the Craig Fitzgibbon 3YO+ sprint over 1000 metres. But it ran second behind Jewel Colours.


By the last race, a few of the players and nearly all of the officials had left. Some elected to have ''staffies'' in a private room.


Less than 24 hours later the money started to roll in. Every man and his dog along the east coast wanted to back the
Roosters' rivals, the North Queensland Cowboys, to win by
13 points-plus. Friends of friends went to TAB outlets, laying out sums of money under the $10,000 reportable threshold. Typically, bets were $5000 or $7500.


The weight of money was so intense, the bookies started to get concerned. Was a key player injured? Why did everyone
believe the Roosters would lose by so much, especially when it was Fitzgibbon's last game with the club and the dreaded wooden spoon was at stake? The Roosters should have had everything to play for. Bizarrely no one wanted the shorter odds that they would lose head-to-head.
TAB Sportsbet suspended betting. Roosters insiders confirmed no one was injured, the team would take the field as listed. Betting reopened. But the game still had a smell about it.


Tab Sportsbet's Glenn Munsie said: ''The reason betting was suspended was the fact that whenever anyone wanted a bet of any decent nature [on the game], it was for the Cowboys to win by 13-plus. They didn't want to back them to win the game in the head to head, they didn't want to back them in the line market either. Do they want to take $5.85? They take $5.85. Now they want to take $5, now they want to take $4.50, now they want to take $4 … but hang on, why don't they want to back North Queensland to win the game? Why do they only want to attack this market?''


Munsie said the first bet rolled in at 7pm on the Thursday, followed by a ''steady stream''.


''It wasn't one or two people,'' he said. ''They were coming from all over the place. There were bets arriving from Queensland … agencies in Sydney. There were account customers backing them, all by 13-plus.


''We have blokes who have $50,000-$60,000 on teams every day. Nobody was betting that sort of money on this particular game. These bets ranged from $500 or $600 to $5000 or $6000.''


The news of the betting plunge was leaked. One insider claimed it was to try to stymie a fixed result. There had been similar concerns over other games, among them the Roosters' 44-12 loss to Manly.


Before the Cowboys game, the Roosters' mentor Phil Gould spoke about the importance of teamwork and how Fitzgibbon had been such a role model. With Gould's powerful words resonating in their ears, the Roosters started strongly. Sean Kenny-Dowall scooted down the sideline to score, followed soon after by the other Roosters winger, Iwi Hauraki.


Big Willie Mason backed up a blindside play and the score advanced to 16-0. The Roosters were on fire.


The Roosters camp had seen this before. Over the previous six weeks, the club had split into two: a coterie of players that appeared to play well for the first half, but then inexplicably their fitness failed and they started to make simple mistakes in the final 40 minutes.

The rest of team was initially annoyed, then increasingly bitter about this smaller group. They had suspicions, some well-founded. This group was loose, visiting the Camperdown brothel Stiletto on a regular basis, sometimes paying for the prostitutes, often not. Once, a group of players was picked up in a white stretch limousine on returning from playing the Melbourne Storm.


Said one player: ''I'm aware that several of the players have been up there [to Stiletto] on a weekly basis throughout the year. It's generally at the start of the week, during recovery.


''On occasions they are receiving free services. I don't know why or how that works. The majority of the players don't want to be associated with it.
I stay as far away as possible.''


On the Sunday after that final match of the season against the Cowboys - in which the Roosters let in 32 unanswered points after being ahead 16-0, fulfilling the bookies' nightmare of a payout - these players were at it again. Nothing like drowning their wooden spoon sorrows with a hooker or three. Even better, on that night they didn't have to pay.


Contacted by the Herald, Fitzgibbon, a former captain, could not countenance the game was possibly thrown.

''For what was my most special day of my career, if this was to be true, I'd be disgusted. If I find anyone in my team … I don't know what my actions would be. I find just the thought of it so disgusting. It didn't happen. It just didn't. It just couldn't have happened. The Cowboys were the better team on the day.''

But another player wasn't so sure. The second-half performance ''looked dodgy'' and, he acknowledged, it wasn't the first time during the season.
What of the match-fixing allegations? The player said: ''It's suspicious to me. It's a sh*t situation. I don't have the answers but neither do I want to be the one asking the questions.

''When I heard the rumours, I was stunned. I thought, this doesn't happen, does it? It can't be happening, not at my club. Now, looking back, I can't say that it didn't. There's one person that would do it.''


The NRL's director of communications, John Brady, said there had been no investigation into the match. ''We can't have an inquiry every time the bookie loses,'' he said. ''But if someone comes forward with some information then we look at it.''


Munsie said as an outsider, the Roosters' second-half performance ''did not look good,'' especially in light of the half-time lead and the game being Fitzgibbon's farewell.


''In the last couple of minutes, when you're down by 10, why are you throwing the ball around like you are the Harlem Globetrotters on your own line? Everything looked so lackadaisical, like they couldn't give a rat's. The fact that I was talking it up and it appeared in the paper that day, looks even worse.


''It's hard to believe you could write and publish a story like that and then, basically, it all comes true.''

Its not that i live in denial, i think most have there suspicions about that particular game in 09, but do we really want to bring this up again in an open public forum, especially now?

Just a thought, thats all.

[Guest]

Our 09 season really is dodgy, the second halves just stank....I remember we all started blaming Freddo's half time white board but seriously who knows any more.

Our 2008 season is just as bad. The club was leading the ladder at the 12 or 15 round mark losing only two or three times then we saw an avalanche of losses that came due to poor second half performances.

[Jacks Fur Coat]

Call me a hopeless romantic but I dont feel any good about these revelations, regardless of who gets smacked.

Ultimately the game that we all follow so religiously is tarnished.

[dj_sta]

I read somewhere today that apparently a player who switched clubs after Xmas last year failed a drug test at his old club just before Xmas and that was one of the reasons he was asked to move.... I dont know who it is and which clubs. And I think this story was in the Telecrap but I hope its not who I think it is......

[007]

Seriously, I reckon the last Manly premiership is looking very, very shaky. (This would have the added benefit of restoring the Roosters 38-0 GF record.)

I still consider it a record given try's were worth 3 points back then.

Eastern Suburbs 38

Tries: Brass (2), Mayes (2), McKay, Beetson, Pickett, Schubert
Goals: Peard (7)

St George 0

Ahhhhh..... memories!

[kurtsherlock6]

Call me a hopeless romantic but I dont feel any good about these revelations, regardless of who gets smacked.

Ultimately the game that we all follow so religiously is tarnished.

Well said Jack.

[stsae]

SMH

IT WAS a fun day in Craig Fitzgibbon's honour - a horse race named after him at Randwick on the very day that Mrs Racing, Gai Waterhouse, was celebrating her birthday.


But by week's end the bonhomie had turned sour. The Roosters camp, tenuously fractured, is now bitterly, guttingly divided. The Roosters are battling accusations that they may have thrown the last game of the season. Players are pointing fingers. A small group of ''loose'' players, the clan that often visits brothels, has been ostracised. Their dropped balls and missed tackles may have gone too far.


One furious player told the Herald yesterday: ''I'd kill them myself [for destroying Fitzy's day]. That makes me sick. That's our life. If I find out it was some of my teammates threw it, there'll be trouble.'' Another suspected that a teammate was firmly involved. Players' future contracts are on the line.


But back to Wednesday, September 2. Most of the Roosters players attended the Randwick races in support of Fitzy and his stellar rugby league career. Outwardly it was a grand day of fun, fashion and frippery. Quite a few players had backed a horse called Fitness Fanatic, in recognition of Fitzgibbon's propensity for hard training, in race four, the Craig Fitzgibbon 3YO+ sprint over 1000 metres. But it ran second behind Jewel Colours.


By the last race, a few of the players and nearly all of the officials had left. Some elected to have ''staffies'' in a private room.


Less than 24 hours later the money started to roll in. Every man and his dog along the east coast wanted to back the
Roosters' rivals, the North Queensland Cowboys, to win by
13 points-plus. Friends of friends went to TAB outlets, laying out sums of money under the $10,000 reportable threshold. Typically, bets were $5000 or $7500.


The weight of money was so intense, the bookies started to get concerned. Was a key player injured? Why did everyone
believe the Roosters would lose by so much, especially when it was Fitzgibbon's last game with the club and the dreaded wooden spoon was at stake? The Roosters should have had everything to play for. Bizarrely no one wanted the shorter odds that they would lose head-to-head.
TAB Sportsbet suspended betting. Roosters insiders confirmed no one was injured, the team would take the field as listed. Betting reopened. But the game still had a smell about it.


Tab Sportsbet's Glenn Munsie said: ''The reason betting was suspended was the fact that whenever anyone wanted a bet of any decent nature [on the game], it was for the Cowboys to win by 13-plus. They didn't want to back them to win the game in the head to head, they didn't want to back them in the line market either. Do they want to take $5.85? They take $5.85. Now they want to take $5, now they want to take $4.50, now they want to take $4 … but hang on, why don't they want to back North Queensland to win the game? Why do they only want to attack this market?''


Munsie said the first bet rolled in at 7pm on the Thursday, followed by a ''steady stream''.


''It wasn't one or two people,'' he said. ''They were coming from all over the place. There were bets arriving from Queensland … agencies in Sydney. There were account customers backing them, all by 13-plus.


''We have blokes who have $50,000-$60,000 on teams every day. Nobody was betting that sort of money on this particular game. These bets ranged from $500 or $600 to $5000 or $6000.''


The news of the betting plunge was leaked. One insider claimed it was to try to stymie a fixed result. There had been similar concerns over other games, among them the Roosters' 44-12 loss to Manly.


Before the Cowboys game, the Roosters' mentor Phil Gould spoke about the importance of teamwork and how Fitzgibbon had been such a role model. With Gould's powerful words resonating in their ears, the Roosters started strongly. Sean Kenny-Dowall scooted down the sideline to score, followed soon after by the other Roosters winger, Iwi Hauraki.


Big Willie Mason backed up a blindside play and the score advanced to 16-0. The Roosters were on fire.


The Roosters camp had seen this before. Over the previous six weeks, the club had split into two: a coterie of players that appeared to play well for the first half, but then inexplicably their fitness failed and they started to make simple mistakes in the final 40 minutes.

The rest of team was initially annoyed, then increasingly bitter about this smaller group. They had suspicions, some well-founded. This group was loose, visiting the Camperdown brothel Stiletto on a regular basis, sometimes paying for the prostitutes, often not. Once, a group of players was picked up in a white stretch limousine on returning from playing the Melbourne Storm.


Said one player: ''I'm aware that several of the players have been up there [to Stiletto] on a weekly basis throughout the year. It's generally at the start of the week, during recovery.


''On occasions they are receiving free services. I don't know why or how that works. The majority of the players don't want to be associated with it.
I stay as far away as possible.''


On the Sunday after that final match of the season against the Cowboys - in which the Roosters let in 32 unanswered points after being ahead 16-0, fulfilling the bookies' nightmare of a payout - these players were at it again. Nothing like drowning their wooden spoon sorrows with a hooker or three. Even better, on that night they didn't have to pay.


Contacted by the Herald, Fitzgibbon, a former captain, could not countenance the game was possibly thrown.

''For what was my most special day of my career, if this was to be true, I'd be disgusted. If I find anyone in my team … I don't know what my actions would be. I find just the thought of it so disgusting. It didn't happen. It just didn't. It just couldn't have happened. The Cowboys were the better team on the day.''

But another player wasn't so sure. The second-half performance ''looked dodgy'' and, he acknowledged, it wasn't the first time during the season.
What of the match-fixing allegations? The player said: ''It's suspicious to me. It's a sh*t situation. I don't have the answers but neither do I want to be the one asking the questions.

''When I heard the rumours, I was stunned. I thought, this doesn't happen, does it? It can't be happening, not at my club. Now, looking back, I can't say that it didn't. There's one person that would do it.''


The NRL's director of communications, John Brady, said there had been no investigation into the match. ''We can't have an inquiry every time the bookie loses,'' he said. ''But if someone comes forward with some information then we look at it.''


Munsie said as an outsider, the Roosters' second-half performance ''did not look good,'' especially in light of the half-time lead and the game being Fitzgibbon's farewell.


''In the last couple of minutes, when you're down by 10, why are you throwing the ball around like you are the Harlem Globetrotters on your own line? Everything looked so lackadaisical, like they couldn't give a rat's. The fact that I was talking it up and it appeared in the paper that day, looks even worse.


''It's hard to believe you could write and publish a story like that and then, basically, it all comes true.''

Teabags a few questions mate.

When was that article written and by whom??? You have not provided a link is all. I'm not doubting the article I am just interested to know the timeframe in relation to the sorta alleged incident.

What is the difference from your point of view between this article of rumors and say the 2010 GF allegations or my News paranoia conspiracy laden dribble??? Personally i believe if you are willing to swallow some rumors/allegations but dismiss others as the ramblings of a nutter, well it comes across as a little strange and say agenda driven. IMO of course.


About that game and those allegations, my personal view at the time was I thought it was bullshit. Mainly due to the fact we had been playing that way, leading at 1/2 time then getting thrashed in the second 1/2 of many games, for about a year and a 1/2 before that. Looking at it now I must say there may be more to it than I originally thought. Definitely a dark time to be an Easts fan.


And some breaking News I know you will appreciate, the Wankos have announced on the radio news up here that there has never been any history of drug taking at their fine upstanding morally sound organization. That's seriously what was said. I for one appreciate and commend them on their forthright stance in helping clear the air on this most serious of matter.

[Salvatori Grubber]

On Fitzy's last game, the moment the penny dropped for me was when at around the 60th minute, a Cowboys player made a break at the 40m mark, about 10m in from the eastern touch line and The Mumbler easily could have caught the attacker, but just gave up as though it was a lost cause. The game was in the balance at that point.

Tbh, if any current squad members were implicit in any way with the throwing of a game - let alone that game - I want them publicly outed and tried. I don't care how that affects our 2013.