By Chris Wright
They even managed to fluff two penalties!
FIFA have confirmed that a ‘routine’ investigation into Bahrain’s convenient tonking over Indonesia side last night, after rumblings of match-fixing and jiggery-pokey began to surface.
Going into the match, Bahrain needed to peg back a nine-goal deficit on World Cup qualifying group leaders to have any chance of making it through to the next phase. Bahrain went on to hit ten unanswered goals past a weakened Indonesia side, who were also reduced to ten men after two minutes when their goalkeeper was sent off.
The highlights are here if you fancy casting a beady over them.
Said FIFA:
“Our security will conduct a routine examination of this game and its result given the unusual outcome against results expectation and head-to-head history – and in the interests of maintaining unequivocal confidence in our game.”
Basically, if there’s any jiggery-pokery going on, FIFA want a slice.
Bahrain (who are coached by former England manager Peter Taylor) also needed Qatar to lose their final match against Iran, but they squeaked an 83rd-minute equaliser to draw 2-2 and advance through to the next stage of the Asian qualifying tournament, while Bahrain were dumped out regardless of their scoreline.
(Alleged) money well spent!