Serbian tennis player Stefan Milicevic has been handed a 24-year suspension from all sanctioned tennis after the International Tennis Integrity Agency found he fixed matches and recruited other players into a corrupt network between 2022 and 2024. The penalty, announced on 15 October 2026, includes a $70,000 fine and runs until 8 October 2050. BBC Sport said it is among the strongest punishments anti-corruption officials have issued short of a lifetime ban. The ITIA has attributed part of the severity to Milicevic's failure to cooperate with its investigation.
Match-fixing and recruitment findings
The ITIA said Milicevic fixed six matches, including five in which he was competing, and attempted to fix six more during the period from 2022 to 2024. The agency also brought charges that he recruited or tried to recruit a number of professional players into what it termed a corrupt network, and that some of those players then fixed matches themselves. Milicevic, who reached a career-high ATP ranking of 1,338 in 2014, spent his career mainly on lower-level tours before this case.
Why the ban was so severe
The ITIA investigation took place this year. According to the BBC, the independent body made seven separate attempts to reach Milicevic, but he did not engage with the process. The agency used the phrase "did not engage" in describing his response. That lack of cooperation was identified as a factor in determining the length of the sanction. The 24-year ban will keep Milicevic out of the sport until he is 53; the fine is worth about £53,000.
Conditions of the suspension
While the ban is active, Milicevic may not play, coach or attend any event organised or sanctioned by World Tennis, the WTA, the ATP, the Grand Slams or any national association. The ITIA set out those restrictions in its statement. The suspension will formally end on 8 October 2050, according to Sky Sports.
Previous match-fixing sanctions
In December, the ITIA imposed a 20-year ban on French player Quentin Folliot for match-fixing. Folliot, whose career-high ranking was 488 in 2022, was also fined $70,000 and ordered to hand back more than $44,000 that the agency treated as corrupt payments tied to 27 violations of the Tennis Anti-Corruption Programme, according to The Telegraph. He contested allegations involving 11 matches in 2022-2024, eight of which he played in, but a hearing upheld 27 of the 30 charges. The Telegraph reported that Folliot was the sixth player punished in that same investigation, following sanctions against Jaimee Floyd Angele, Paul Valsecchi, Luc Fomba, Lucas Bouquet and Enzo Rimoli.
A wider enforcement pattern
The Milicevic case is the second lengthy suspension in less than a year, according to the Telegraph. The December ban for Folliot also involved a fine and a repayment order, and both cases emerged from the ITIA's work on match-fixing networks in professional tennis. The BBC noted that players recruited by Milicevic had also been accused of fixing matches. These sanctions show the ITIA's readiness to issue long bans when players are found to have led corrupt networks or refused to cooperate with inquiries.
