TOKYO (AP) — Local media reported Saturday that the Japan Sumo Association will cancel a tournament in March due to a match-fixing scandal.
Quoting unnamed sources, Kyodo News agency reported that the Spring Grand Sumo Tournament from March 13-27 is set to be called off at a meeting Sunday. An association official declined to confirm the report.
The Yomiuri daily also said the tournament will be canceled, which would be the first time that has happened since Ryogoku Kokugikan, Japan's main sumo venue, was renovated in 1946 because of damage from World War II.
The scandal is the latest blow for sumo, which is reeling from a string of embarrassing incidents, including illegal gambling and drug use among wrestlers.
Sumo traces its origins to religious purification rites. Most Japanese see sumo wrestlers as the keepers of a prized tradition, and expect them to observe a high standard of public behavior and wear their hair in topknots like the samurai of old.
The association said last week police had found text messages on confiscated mobile phones that implicate as many as 13 wrestlers in schemes to fix matches. On Thursday, two wrestlers and a coach admitted fixing bouts.
Last year, several wrestlers were arrested for betting illegally on baseball games, allegedly with gangsters as go-betweens. That scandal followed allegations in 2009 of widespread marijuana use among the ranks that led to the expulsion of three Russian fighters.
Rumors of ties between sumo wrestlers and the underworld have been rife, and the baseball gambling scandal deeply hurt sumo's image.
Unsubstantiated allegations of gangster involvement in bout-fixing have plagued the sport for decades, but have never been proved. There were no immediate reports of gangsters mentioned in the latest scandal.
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