Phantom Players, Fake Deals: Seven Arrests Over FK Bor
Police arrested seven people, including the club president and general secretary, on suspicion they defrauded football club FK Bor of more than four million dinars through fake contracts and illicit loans.
- Seven people were arrested, among them the club president and general secretary; one more suspect is being sought.
- The damage is estimated at 4,022,457 dinars.
- Contracts were signed with reserve and phantom players who never took the field, alongside fake gym-use agreements.
- Phantom hirings brought in about 1.71 million dinars, while payments from the club account added roughly 2.3 million more.
Police have arrested seven people suspected of defrauding football club FK Bor of more than four million dinars through abuse of office. The club president and general secretary are among those detained. A search is under way for one more person.
According to the investigation, the damage is estimated at 4,022,457 dinars. The abuses are believed to have run over an extended period, carried out through arrangements that looked orderly on paper but were false in substance. None of the suspects has been convicted.
How was money drained from the club?
The core mechanism, investigators suspect, was a series of contracts with players who were barely present on the pitch. The club is said to have signed deals with reserve and so-called phantom players who never actually played. Alongside these, fake agreements over the use of the gym were reportedly concluded as well.
Those phantom engagements are said to have generated about 1.71 million dinars in illicit gain. A further 2.3 million dinars, according to the investigation, was drawn directly through payments from the club account. This was money meant to fund the running of a sports organization.
The president and general secretary are charged with abuse of a position of responsibility. The other suspects are charged with aiding and abetting. That means prosecutors will have to prove not only that the fake arrangements existed, but who took part in them and to what degree.
For now the suspects are treated as persons under investigation. The presumption of innocence applies until a court rules. It will be the court, not the police, that weighs the evidence and establishes any responsibility.
What does this case mean for small clubs?
FK Bor is a provincial club, without large budgets or the attention that Belgrade’s giants enjoy. Clubs like it survive on modest funds, membership fees and local donations. When more than four million dinars is suspected of vanishing from such a treasury, the fallout reaches beyond the club to the community that follows it.
The case raises the question of financial oversight in lower-tier clubs. Fake contracts and bogus deals rarely survive where records are kept properly and where there is independent scrutiny. Where oversight is missing, room opens for abuses that surface only once the damage has grown.
The investigation is still ongoing. Prosecutors have yet to decide on further measures against those arrested and on any request for detention. The search for the eighth person has not ended.
How well protected, in your view, are small sports clubs from abuses like this?
