9:12 AM
Happy new year 2012
Italian Interior Minister Roberto Maroni.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
ROME -- The Italian government introduced a task force on Friday to combat match-fixing in football but has no plans to limit legal betting on games amid the latest scandal to tarnish the national sport.
The investigative task force will be composed of representatives from the interior ministry, sports federations and the treasury ministry.
Sixteen people were arrested in Italy last week for alleged involvement in a match-fixing and betting ring. Some 18 matches -- mostly in Serie B and C -- are under investigation by prosecutors in Cremona, where the probe is based, and preliminary hearings have suggested Serie A matches could also be involved.
Interior Minister Roberto Maroni unveiled the task force alongside Italian Olympic Committee president Giovanni Petrucci and Italian football federation president Giancarlo Abete.
"Together with Petrucci and Abete we've analysed what has emerged lately in terms of football match-fixing and we're trying to take action so that this can't be repeated," Maroni said.
"Therefore we've decided to create an investigative unit with the aim of gathering information and evaluating abnormal signals from betting parlours and other sources."
Maroni said there's no point in limiting legal betting because that would trigger more illicit gambling.
"Football and sports attract a lot of betting and we're not interested in impeding or limiting that -- but regulating it, yes."
Maroni added that the task force will have the power to use police forces, "because we can't exclude the fact that behind this illicit activity lies the hand of organized crime."
Maroni said the task force would begin meeting next week, calling it "an immediate reaction from the sports world and the government to what happened."
Meanwhile, Benevento goalkeeper Marco Paoloni, one of the 16 people arrested last week, was questioned by Cremona prosecutor Roberto Di Martino on Friday.
The investigation began following a Serie C match between Cremonese and Paganese in November. Cremonese players allegedly had their drinks spiked with drugs so they wouldn't play well, and several players felt ill afterward.
Italian media have reported that Paoloni used his wife's signature to get a prescription for a sleeping drug from a dentist in Ancona the day before the match, but Paoloni told the prosecutor he did not drug his teammates, according to the ANSA news agency.
Paoloni told the prosecutor he was in contact with a match-fixing ring and made promises to try to get his squad to lose, but said he then played regularly, according to ANSA.
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