By Andrew Warshaw at the International Sports Event Management Conference in London

chris eaton 07-11-12November 7 - Chris Eaton, one of the leading corruption busters in world sport says international federations must show more transparency and be less insular when it comes to exposing sleaze and scandal.

Eaton (pictured top), formerly of Interpol and FIFA and now director of sports security at the Doha-based International Centre for Sports Security, says there is still a worrying "jobs for the boys" mentality that needs to be urgently addressed.

Speaking here, Eaton told delegates: "Sporting bodies are still operating very much like clubs: best friends of each other and employing family members, looking for people they are comfortable to work with."

Instead, says Eaton, they should be operating like multi-national businesses rather than hide behind "blue smoke and mirrors".

If it were not for the media, said Eaton, several sports would have got away with corruption and scandal.

"Without the media very little would have been exposed in the last 10 years," he said.

"This is a sad indictment of the approach of sporting bodies."

lance armstrongChris Eaton believes Lance Armstrong's cheating "carries an awful lot of cynical weight"

Referring specifically to the Lance Armstrong doping case, Eaton said it had made both sponsors and spectators far more suspicious about whether athletes are clean and was a wake-up call in terms of the need for cycling and other sports to get tougher.

"Armstrong's 10 years of denial and the great respect that was given to him by so many people carries an awful lot of cynical weight," said Eaton.

"We now know that he cheated."

This, said Eaton, had prompted increased "cynicism among the fan base and at sponsorship level".

"The sport itself must address this in a transparent and open way and put in mechanisms...that are serious about attacking integrity issues with consequences that are not just a slap on the wrist."

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