SOURCE: www.telegraph.co.uk

An influential figure in the betting world has claimed that tennis "has always been liable to corruption".

Mark Davies, the managing director of Betfair, an online bookmakers who have an agreement to alert the tennis authorities to suspicious gambling patterns, argued that the serious threat of corruption in tennis is not new.

"I think that all sport has always been liable to corruption, by the very nature of it producing clear results one way or another. They say that chariot races were rigged for financial reward. I don't see why subsequent sporting events should suddenly have been less liable to corrupt practice," Davies told The Daily Telegraph.

"We would strongly dispute the idea that sport suddenly has a corruption problem because of the boom in gambling."

In August, Betfair refused to pay out on more than £3 million of bets which had been wagered on Russian Nikolay Davydenko's match in Poland against a little-known Argentine player after becoming concerned about irregular betting patterns.

Last month, Betfair delayed payment on bets laid on a women's match played in India after suspicions over the gambling patterns.

"The amount of money bet in the legal market may have grown — who knows if it has risen or fallen in the illegal one? — but the number of people who can be tempted by that money and use it for corrupt reasons is the same as it always was," said Davies.