The Anti-Corruption Hearing Officer, Richard McLaren, has found Ikhlef guilty of various instances of match-fixing, soliciting players not to give their best efforts, failure to report corruption, and failing to cooperate with an investigation.
Ikhlef, a 25-year-old player with a career-high ATP ranking of 1,739 in 2015, has violated several sections of the Tennis Anti-Corruption Program (TACP). This includes contriving or attempting to manipulate match outcomes, soliciting or facilitating other players to not give their best efforts, failure to report interactions involving money, benefits, or considerations to influence game outcomes, and not cooperating with investigations or tampering with evidence.
Ikhlef now joins the list of seven players and officials who have been banned by the Tennis Integrity Unit (TIU) in the past six weeks. The TIU has been actively enforcing the integrity of the sport and recently handed out lifetime and long-term bans to Bulgarian players Karen and Yuri Khachatryan, as well as Aleksandrina Naydenova, for their involvement in match-fixing. Enrique López Pérez of Spain also received a ban and a fine for match-fixing offenses. Ukrainian player Stanislav Poplavskyy and British player George Kennedy were also banned for match-fixing and betting activities. Furthermore, French line judge David Rocher faced an 18-month ban for betting on matches.
Starting from 1 January 2021, the TIU will be known as the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) and will solely focus on enforcing betting integrity in tennis. From 2022 onwards, it will expand to cover doping as well.
