Are Football Fans Turning a Blind Eye? Perception of Corruption and its Implication in Fandom

One of the key premises of the official sport integrity narrative is that a high perception of corruption and manipulation of competitions by fans triggers a loss of interest. The latter may lead to disinterest in sport and the consequent cultural and financial collapse of the sector. We ask whether corruption perceptions on football affect its interest. With evidence gathered though a representative survey carried out in Portugal, this article analyses the correlation between football fans’ corruption perceptions and their interest in the game. We use novel data on corruption perceptions. We test our expectations applying an OLS regression, where we consider interest in football as our main variable of interest and perceptions of corruption in Portugal as our main explanatory variable. Furthermore, we claim that the narrative on the premise of sport integrity is inaccurate as the perception of corruption and deviant behaviour in football does not affects the interest that supporters’ have in it. While football is considered a corrupted industry, the interest of fans remains unalterable despite their gender, ideology, political preference, age, or place of residence. This article is relevant for the discussion of the implications regarding sport integrity policy-making processes and broadly in corruption literature.