Spanish police arrest 34 in match-fixing probe

Madrid - Spanish police have arrested 34 people, including low-ranking players, from a nefarious network that fixed tennis matches in Spain and Portugal, authorities said on Thursday.

All those arrested are Spanish and include six tennis players whose international rankings are between 800 and 1,400 in the world. They were not named.

Players were offered sums of between €500 ($530) and €1,000 to fix matches, a police spokesman told AFP.

"Sometimes they promised €500 and in the end only paid €50. The players were above all the victims," the spokesman added.

The probe, which began in 2013, concerns at least 17 tournaments with estimated takings of over half a million euros.

The latest arrests -- for fraud, corruption and belonging to a criminal organisation -- took place in November, police said.