6 Men's Tennis Players Banned For Match-Fixing

LONDON (AP) — Six Moroccan men’s tennis players, including four who played in the Davis Cup, have been banned in a match-fixing investigation, the International Tennis Integrity Unit said Tuesday.

A hearing found the six players “were guilty of multiple offenses and a variety of match-fixing charges, including fixing elements of matches, receiving money for fixing and failing to report corrupt approaches,” the ITIA said in a statement.

“The ITIA investigation found that the players’ offenses were linked and therefore were subject to a joint hearing,” it said.

The ITIA didn’t say which competitions were affected.

The players were identified as Amine Ahouda, Anas Chakrouni, Ayoub Chakrouni, Mohamed Zakaria Khalil, Soufiane El Mesbahi and Yassir Kilani. Their bans ranged from nine years to a life ban for Ayoub Chakrouni.

Davis Cup records show that Ahouda, Ayoub Chakrouni, El Mesbahi and Kilani were all on Morocco’s team at various times from 2014 to 2019. Ahouda’s career high ranking of 668th is the highest of any of the six players.