SOURCE: www.timesonline.co.uk

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A 96-page dossier has been given to Europol, outlining circumstances around the 15 matches, believed to involve teams from Croatia, Serbia, Bulgaria, Georgia and a Baltic country.

A UEFA source said no fixtures involving English teams were being investigated: “They tend to target games which don’t attract a lot of publicity,” the source added.

“These 15 are games we knew about,” added Platini, “because of the early-warning systems and because we knew, we were able to ‘protect’ these games. But I am concerned and this is a big problem for the future, not only in Europe, but in Asia.”

The gravity of the situation was underlined by Graham Bean, an ex-police officer and the former head of the Football Association’s compliance unit: “These are serious allegations, but having said that they will be difficult to investigate.”

“Clearly for UEFA to pass this report across [to the police] they must have evidence of some kind, perhaps as a result of betting patterns. For something involving these type of games, then this is potentially one of the most serious things that has ever happened in world football.”

Earlier this week, UEFA opened an investigation into the InterToto Cup match between Bulgarians Cherno More and Macedonia’s Makedonija on July 7, which Cherno More won 4-0. The Bulgarian club deny any wrongdoing.

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