SINGAPORE (Reuters) – The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) has set up a task force to help combat matchfixing in the continent, the sport’s regional governing body said on Friday.

The announcement came a day after an INTERPOL-led conference into result rigging closed in Kuala Lumpur.

The task force would collaborate with all stakeholders and educate member associations on ways to combat the practice and introduce mechanisms to fight it, AFC General Secretary Alex Soosay said in a statement.

"Some of our member associations, who have been facing this threat for long, have come up with novel ideas to combat match-fixing and have succeeded in controlling the threat," he said referring to the initiatives taken by football associations of China, Singapore, South Korea and Malaysia.

China has handed life bans to 33 players and officials while Singapore has initiated polygraph tests for players, Soosay said.

"I would like all our MAs to follow the examples of these MAs and join this fight to strengthen the fair play in this game," he added.

(Writing by Amlan Chakraborty in New Delhi; Editing by Peter Rutherford/Greg Stutchbury)

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