No reliable cross-sport measure identifies the 15 “biggest” match-fixing scandals, and the documented cases available here do not support a defensible ranking of 15. This selected list covers nine prominent cases with established reporting or formal findings. It weighs competition level, documented scope, evidence, consequences and lasting impact—not a single comparable measure of size. Some cases involved efforts to influence a final result; others involved spot-fixing, point-shaving or attempts to sway refereeing. Those are related integrity violations, but they are not interchangeable.
What counts as match-fixing—and what does not?
Match-fixing is an attempt to manipulate a sporting contest or an event within it, often for betting gain. The method matters when assessing a case:
- Result fixing means trying to determine the outcome of a match or competition.
- Spot-fixing targets a specific event within a match, such as a delivery in cricket, without necessarily fixing the final result.
- Point-shaving means deliberately limiting a team’s scoring margin, often to affect a betting spread.
- Referee manipulation seeks to influence officials’ appointments or decisions; it does not by itself establish that a particular match result was fixed.
- Betting-rule violations can breach sports rules without proving that a contest was manipulated.
The evidence also differs. An allegation, an admission, a sporting disciplinary finding and a criminal conviction are not the same. The cases below identify those distinctions rather than treating every reported suspicion as proven.
Nine major cases in sports history
1. The 1919 Black Sox scandal — baseball
Eight Chicago White Sox players were indicted in 1920 on charges of fixing the 1919 World Series. A jury found them not guilty, but baseball banned them the following year. The key distinction is that the players were acquitted in court yet faced a separate sporting sanction; it would be inaccurate to say they were convicted. The Associated Press’s historical overview recounts the case and identifies Eight Men Out: The Black Sox and the 1919 World Series as a book about it.
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2. The 1951 college basketball scandal — United States
The Associated Press describes accusations involving 35 active and former players and at least 86 games between 1947 and 1951. Those numbers describe the scope of the accusations reported by AP, not a finding that every player or game was proven to have been fixed. The scale of the allegations made the scandal a major blow to confidence in college basketball.
3. The 1978–79 Boston College point-shaving case — basketball
Former Boston College player Rick Kuhn and four others were convicted of conspiring to fix games, according to the Associated Press. The scheme involved point-shaving: influencing the margin of victory rather than necessarily choosing which team would win. That difference illustrates why a final score alone may not reveal whether a contest was manipulated.
4. Totonero, 1980 — Italian football
The Associated Press reports that two Italian teams were relegated and five others penalized in the Totonero scandal. Paolo Rossi was among those banned for involvement while playing for Perugia. These sanctions show the serious sporting consequences in Italy, but the available account does not provide a comparable total of manipulated matches or a basis for ranking Totonero by size against cases in other sports.
5. The Hoyzer and Bochum investigations, 2004–2011 — football
The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly’s 2012 report describes multiple parts of the Bochum proceedings; figures from one part should not be merged with another or mistaken for a single count of betting activity.
Do these 3 things before closing this tab:
1Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors2Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches3Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems- In the 2005 Hoyzer case, the report said 25 people were implicated and three were finally convicted in that part: referee Robert Hoyzer, referee Dominik Marks and alleged ringleader Ante Sapina. It reported that Sapina won around €2 million by betting on 25 manipulated matches and that Hoyzer’s presumed gain was €70,000.
- In a later part of the proceedings, Sapina was sentenced to five years and six months for manipulating 51 matches involving club and national teams, including Champions League and 2010 World Cup qualifying fixtures across 19 countries.
- For that later investigation, the report cited around €12 million paid to influence participants, more than 6,000 bets placed in Asia and approximately €7.7 million in profit. Payments, bets and profit are different measures—not interchangeable totals.
- Across the first two parts of the procedure, the report said 270 matches were considered manipulated. That is the report’s combined figure for those proceedings, not a count of bets or payments.
The reported reach across countries and competitions makes this one of the most geographically extensive cases in the selected list. The figures above are those in the Parliamentary Assembly’s 2012 account.
6. Calciopoli, 2006 — Italian football
Calciopoli concerned efforts to influence referee designations and seek favorable decisions in contentious situations. It should not be simplified into a claim that every match involving the clubs was proven fixed.
In the sporting proceedings, Juventus was relegated, its 2004–05 title was revoked and left unassigned, and the 2005–06 title was awarded to Inter. Fiorentina, Lazio and Milan also faced sanctions, according to Rai News’s chronology. These are sporting outcomes, separate from criminal proceedings.
Those criminal proceedings had a different record. Corriere reported in 2015 that some offences were time-barred, that the court confirmed the existence of a criminal association as reported by the paper, that Luciano Moggi was acquitted on various sports-fraud charges, and that a suspended sentence for referee Massimo De Santis was confirmed. It is misleading to collapse those outcomes into “everyone was convicted” or to treat them as proof that every match was fixed.
7. Hansie Cronje’s cricket corruption case, 2000 — international cricket
The International Cricket Council says South African captain Hansie Cronje admitted receiving money from a bookmaker for personal gain and to influence international cricket matches. The ICC also says he attempted to use his authority to induce teammates to underperform. Its 2010 statement reported that his life ban from playing and coaching at first-class and international level had been upheld. The ICC account does not establish a total number of fixed matches, so none should be inferred.
8. Pakistan’s 2010 Lord’s Test spot-fixing case — cricket
The ICC says Salman Butt, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif were found guilty of charges relating to spot-fixing during the Lord’s Test between England and Pakistan in August 2010. Butt was also found guilty of failing to report an approach connected to the Oval Test earlier that month. The case involved deliberate no-balls at specified points in play; that is spot-fixing, not an allegation that the final result of the Lord’s Test was fixed.
The ICC reported that Butt received a ten-year ban, with five years suspended subject to conditions. Its later statement records that appeals by Butt and Asif were rejected by the Court of Arbitration for Sport. These are disciplinary and appeal outcomes, not a claim that the match result was manipulated.
9. The Debrecen case — Hungarian football
The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly’s report summarizes a case in which a criminal organization manipulated a Champions League match. Two players were convicted, though one conviction was later set aside by the Court of Arbitration for Sport. That later change is important: the case cannot accurately be reduced to a claim that both players’ convictions remained in force.
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Which scandal involved the most matches?
Among the quantified cases described here, the Parliamentary Assembly’s 2012 report gives the largest combined match figure for the first two parts of the Bochum procedure: 270 matches were considered manipulated. That is a figure from a specific report and set of proceedings, not an all-sports record established by a common measurement. The same report separately cites 51 matches in a later Sapina case, around €12 million in payments, more than 6,000 bets and approximately €7.7 million in profit. Those figures describe different things and should not be added together or presented as one measure of case size.
Why a definitive all-time ranking is not possible
These cases cannot be sorted by one objective “biggest” score. Some sources count matches, while others describe teams, players, countries, bets or money. Some cases ended in criminal convictions; others involved sporting sanctions, admissions, allegations or decisions made in separate proceedings. A case’s lasting public impact also cannot be reduced to a number comparable across sports.
For those reasons, this is a selected set of documented scandals, not an exhaustive top 15 or a claim that the first case listed is objectively the largest. The cases show how manipulation can target an entire result, a scoring margin, an isolated event or the officials who shape a contest—and why the evidence and consequences must be stated precisely.
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