Criminal law protection of sports – fiction or necessity?

The article analyses the need to single out relations in sports as an independent subject of crime and the feasibility of creating a special chapter “Crimes in Sports” in the Criminal Code of Russia. Based on statistical data, the authors assess the effectiveness of current criminal law provisions related to protecting sports relations and draw conclusions about their ineffectiveness. They comment on the shortcomings of these provisions that adversely impact the possibility of applying them in practice. The authors propose amendments to criminal law.