HKJC refuses to take bets on new Chinese Super League

The Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) has announced that it will not take bets on the new Chinese Super League (CSL) club football competition, as it still has a number of concerns over the integrity of the tournament.

The CSL has attracted worldwide interest in recent weeks after various clubs secured the signings of high profile players for significant transfer fees, partly funded by a major television rights deal between the league and Chinese internet company LeTV.

Colombian striker Jackson Martinez joined Guangzhou Evergrande from Spanish side Atletico Madrid for €42 million ($45.7 million), while Brazil’s Alex Teixeira signed for Jiangsu Suning from Ukrainian outfit Shakhtar Donetsk for a fee of €50 million.

However, despite widespread interest in the league across Hong Kong, the HKJC has stated that it will not take bets on the CSL, stating that it has to “safeguard the interests” of its customers.

“During the match selection process, the club considers a number of important factors including information transparency, integrity and competitiveness of football matches etc, so as to safeguard the interests of the club and our customers,” a spokesperson said, according to the South China Morning Post newspaper.

“At this stage, we do not have any plans to offer the Chinese Super League matches.”

Chinese football has suffered from problems with corruption in the past, but the Asian Football Confederation has struck a deal with sports and betting-related services firm Sportradar to monitor all of Asia’s top football competitions.

Alex Inglot, director of communications and public affairs at Sportradar, said that the influx of money and top players should not cause an issue for the league or betting operators.

He added: “I think it’s important to say first that we haven’t monitored the Chinese Super League up to this point, but if you’re looking at vulnerability or risk assessment I’m not sure a lot of money pouring in is something that would pique our interest.

“I’m not sure if it’s true, but most would argue that the more money you have to pay players, the less susceptible they are to match-fixing, as long as they are being paid regularly.

“We wouldn’t see [the money] as a concern; what might be a concern is if players are not paid or paid irregularly – but I haven’t seen reports of that around what’s going on with the evolution in China.

“As with any country, no-one can be complacent and we will be monitoring the league going forward, but at the moment I don’t think the evolution or changing landscape [in Chinese football] has made us more or less focused on it as a country.”

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