Jimmy Bartel says Melbourne’s 2009 conduct was ‘match fixing’

Jimmy Bartel says Melbourne’s conduct in the 2009 season should be called “match fixing”, not tanking.

Transcripts have revealed allegations of bullying and threats towards senior staff at the Melbourne Football Club to make sure they continued to lose matches during the 2009 season.

More than 80 pages of transcripts seen by the Herald Sun exposes interviews conducted with more than current and former Demons staff in 2012, as part of a probe into allegations of tanking.

Speaking on Macquarie Sports Radio, Bartel said he “doesn’t get why” people “dance around” what Melbourne did in 2009.

“Let’s call it what it really is,” the 3AW Football analyst said.

“Tanking is a nice word (but) it’s match fixing – I don’t get why we dance around it.

“You can’t go out and deliberately stack a game so your side doesn’t win for a future draft pick, that is match fixing at its finest.”

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