The Vietnamese football season begins on Sunday following a gambling and betting scandal which badly tarnished the image of the sport last year. Seven players from last season's premier division champions, the Ho Chi Minh City Customs House team, are being investigated for alleged involvement in match-fixing and illegal betting syndicates. Two players have already been suspended for the whole of the forthcoming season, after they confessed to fixing matches. From Ho Chi Minh City, Henry Tang reports.

Official confirmation that this year's national football championships would begin on time was only given last Saturday. Until then, football fans in Vietnam had though the season would have to be delayed because of the controversy surrounding the on-going investigation into last year's match-fixing scandal.

The championships were finally given the go-ahead after the sports minister, Ha Quang Du, said he was confident that what he called the negative activities marring football would be eliminated. The players said to be involved in the scandal are alleged to have received up to a total of $150,000 per game to fix the final scores of matches for betting synicates.

Although betting on football matches is illegal in Vietnam, the practice is wide-spread because the authorities have turned a blind eye to it. But football fans say officials realise they had to investigate the activities of gambling rings after the fixing of scores became all too obvious.