Sports and Crime Briefing

Sports and Crime Briefing

Match-Fixing

Is Australia Too Lenient on Its Corrupt Athletes? Two A-League Stars Just Walked Free

A Colombian syndicate paid Australian football players $10,000 to get yellow cards. They escaped prison and even a criminal conviction, but their mastermind's trial is ongoing.

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Chris Dalby
Sep 29, 2025
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Two Macarthur FC players took A$10,000 each to get themselves booked. But what looked like just another routine yellow-card scam spiralled into Australia’s biggest football integrity case in a decade.

The Sports and Crime Briefing breaks down why Clayton Lewis and Kearyn Baccus walked out of court without convictions, why they may never set foot on a professional pitch again, how they were lured by Colombian criminals, and what this says about match-fixing in Australia

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