Blake Morgan successfully represents Darius Knight to overturn match fixing charge

Blake Morgan is pleased to announce that its Sports Law team has successfully acted on behalf of Darius Knight, a former England international table tennis player. With representation and advice from the law firm, Mr Knight was able to overturn a match fixing charge and related five-year sanction that was imposed on him by Table Tennis England’s (TTE’s) Disciplinary Committee in March 2025.

This disciplinary matter involved various alleged breaches of TTE’s Anti-Corruption and Disciplinary Regulations relating to match fixing and betting activity. After facing the Disciplinary Committee unrepresented in March 2025, Mr Knight instructed Blake Morgan’s Sports Law team to act for him on his appeal against the findings. Following a thorough review of TTE’s Disciplinary Committee’s findings, which took place over eight months, the independent Appeals Panel of TTE overturned the match fixing charge, and the related sanction of five years imposed by TTE’s Disciplinary Committee.

The Appeals Panel determined that the Committee’s findings of fact described by the Panel as “sparse” were not capable of forming the basis of a finding that Mr Knight was a party to match fixing. Accordingly, the Appeals Panel decisively overturned the charge and cleared Mr Knight of match fixing.

As well as overturning the match fixing charge, the Appeals Panel also reduced a sanction against Mr Knight for the charge of sharing inside information for betting purposes (a charge that he has consistently denied), lowering it from five to three years. Mr Knight did not choose to appeal other charges of betting on table tennis, or of failure to provide reasonable assistance to a TTE investigation. As a result of the successful appeals, the Appeals Panel also reduced the portion of investigation costs payable by Mr Knight by 25 per cent.

Blake Morgan’s Sports Law team worked tirelessly with Mr Knight and Mr Max Baines of Red Lion Chambers to ensure that Mr Knight’s position was fully and fairly represented throughout the Appeals process. This successful outcome reflects the law firm’s significant commitment to, and in-depth experience of, providing robust legal support in complex regulatory and integrity matters within sport.

Hannah Clipston, Litigation & Dispute Resolution Partner at Blake Morgan, commented:

Head of Sport and Partner at Blake Morgan, Dov Katz said:

Darius Knight added:

Blake Morgan’s dedicated team of sports lawyers represent sports personalities including international footballers, in both their personal lives and professional careers, and understand the sports industry from both a legal, commercial and professional sportsperson perspective. They provide advice across the full spectrum of legal issues as a full-service law firm with six offices across the UK.

For more information, and legal advice, please contact Dov Katz or Hannah Clipston.