And like all new leaders, he has radical new ideas he’s looking to pass. Frustrated with the state of officiating in the top flight, Shevchenko wants to subject referees to random polygraph tests to determine if they’ve been bribed by club officials. Known more commonly as lie detector tests, they measure blood pressure, blood flow, respiratory rate and sweat responses to make a conclusion of whether someone is telling the truth or not. “We see the polygraph as an opportunity to get more information to understand which referees we can work with and which ones we can’t,” Shevchenko said.
“We are starting from a clean slate.”
Helping him roll it out is former ref Kateryna Monzul, who was voted the best female official in the world in 2015, in her new role as head of the referee committee. Metalist Kharkiv suffered the same fate in 2013. In more recent years betting-related match fixing has grown in prominence, with criminal gangs orchestrating widespread operations. In 2018, 35 clubs were accused of being involved in one such plot which is said to have earned fixers in Asia almost €4million (£3.41m).
