“I stopped sleeping at night. The more time passed, the more I became obsessed with debt. They increased and I only thought about betting to try to recover. ‘I will break your legs,’ they even told me.” These words of Nicolò FagioliJuventus midfielder, are included in his statement before the Italian Federal Prosecutor’s Office for the ‘Betting case’ (‘Betting case’) in which they were involved Sandro Tonali (Newcastle) y Nicolò Zaniolo (Aston Villa). Three elite protagonists in an investigation focused on quicksand that drags down more and more athletes. A toxic environment that affects the physical and mental integrity of athletes.
Fagioli has been banned for seven months unable to play after admitting that he bet illegally. Despite this, Juventus renewed him in November in 2028. For the same reason, Tonali will not be able to play matches for ten months. Zaniolo was exempt from a sporting punishment, after it was proven that he only played poker and blackjack on illegal platforms. Tonali and Zaniolo, internationals with the Italian team, had to leave the ‘Azzurra’ camp. The Aston Villa man returned in the last window.
Betting to deal with stress
“Gaming addiction is spreading across all sports. It is a silent plague. Years ago, alcohol and drugs were ways to deal with high stress. Now, these drugs cannot be taken regularly if you want to be a high-performance athlete, so our young athletes are turning to gambling addiction. Unfortunately, everything that makes them good athletes ends up making them lousy players,” he tells The Spanish Newspaperfrom the Prensa Ibérica group, Declan Hill.
This investigative journalist also has a doctorate in Sociology from the University of Oxford. He is the author of ‘The Fix: Soccer and Organized Crime (2010)’, the most complete work that exists on the global market for sports betting and fixing, whose activity has affected tournaments such as the Champions League (matches of the group stage) or the World Cup (The Ghana – Brazil of the 2006 World Cup in Germany was an example).
“There are a series of physiological mechanisms, as in any addiction, that lead to gambling. The person bets to obtain a reward. When they lose, the tendency is to try to quickly recover what they have bet. This is combined with wanting to make money easily . By believing that you have done it once, with something that has generated satisfaction, you think that there will be another time. I bet because I need to bet and if I don’t do it I don’t get that reward,” describes David Peris, president of the Spanish Federation of Sports Psychology (FEPD).
The list of athletes at the first level who suffered from gambling addiction is extensive. From Michael Jordan a Floyd Mayweathergoing by Wayne Rooney or the recent case of Ivan Toney. The Brentford and England striker was banned this year for breaking betting rules more than 260 times.
Young athletes are more addicted
“According to the Gambling Law, footballers and athletes in general cannot bet on their discipline. This prohibition also affects managers. We have had cases that have required professional intervention. The information is very necessary,” explains María José López, co-director of the Legal Department of the AFE and head of Integrity of a union that has provided support to professional and semi-professional players, to this newspaper.
“Some people think: ‘If the neighbor next door is betting 20 euros and 100 euros, why not me? It’s not crazy what I’m going to win,’ but it is a crime. Frivolity must be eliminated, whatever the amount bet, regardless of how lucrative the activity is.“adds the AFE member about the lightness with which this problem is still perceived.
“A lot of people cover it up and don’t fix it until they’re in a big hole. But nowadays, 70% of young players on normal or regional teams are bettors“, reveals Juan Carlos Gallego, president of APAL (Association for the Prevention and Help of Gamblers).
“In the future there will be more and more minors addicted to gambling (there are applications like Omada that allow these operations). Currently, in the United Kingdom there are at least 55,000 addicted teenagers. We could take a football stadium with them. And this is a figure that the gaming industry admits, so reality will surely get worse,” argues Declan Hill, a journalist specializing in betting.
“Young athletes get into betting because it seems easy for them to win. As soon as they start losing, they get hooked and it becomes an addiction.. In the Professional Football League and other championships there are programs to prevent athletes from falling, but sometimes they have been the ones who have gotten involved because they needed to recover the money,” explains psychologist David Peris (FEPD).
The particular problem of tennis
Juan Carlos Gallego, president of APAL, defines himself as “a player, because one never stops being one”. He came to the entity after having a problem with sports betting, a profile that is repeated more and more. “Before, those affected came from machines, bingos, casinos or lotteries… Now between 70 and 80% are young people, even with good careersand they are addicted to sports betting, roulette or online poker,” explains Gallego, who once was a true soccer fan.
“In the last eight years I have seen six games. Tennis has been completely left aside, it is very aggressive“adds the head of APAL. “There are sports in which it is easier to fall. In tennis you can bet on each point. You have to think that many players cannot win too much if they are not very high, but the subject of betting is very sweet. There are people who can take advantage, that is why it is important to work well on the issue of gambling addiction,” adds Peris, from the Spanish Federation of Sports Psychology, about this particular problem.
“You have to continue maintaining some guidelines. I continue to deliver my expenses at home. Most relapses happen because people become overconfident.. They believe that they have already overcome a problem that is directly marked by personality. If I play bingo or an ONCE ticket, one day I will end up buying ten cards, unfortunately,” adds the president of APAL.
It is the spiral that surrounds the player and that must keep his entire life at bay. Fagioli said in his statement that it was Tonali, in a concentration with the Italian under-21 team, who induced him to make the first bets. He did it because he had “too much free time”, one of the aspects that is most worked on at APAL.
Federal suspensions and threats
Added to this is that access, both to legal and illegal portals, is easier than ever. “There is no specific education for young athletes about this threat. With mobile phones, a new form of ‘frictionless gaming’ has been developed which is more addictive than heroin,” insists researcher Declan Hill. AFE holds awareness talks throughout the season.
“Betting is a crime with which you expose yourself to administrative sanctions, but also sporting sanctions. If you are making an illegal bet, the data is crossed through the SIGMA system (Global Betting Market Research Service). They can reach the Federation and prevent you from carrying out your professional activity“warns María José López.
In the worst case scenario, players are subject to extortion. Behind the “I will break your legs” that Fagioli denounced is the activity of criminal organizations. “At AFE we worry that there is no one participating in a network and we fight so that there are no scapegoatswhere your identity is used to usurp data,” explains the union’s Integrity Manager.
The ‘Scommesse case’, due to the nature of its protagonists, serves to put the focus back on a problem that is much more difficult to identify in categories that are not so professionalized. Third party players have gone to entities like APAL, “because it is more difficult with elite footballers, as they try to hide. We see many young people who play football or tennis at a different level who have problems. It is true that the majority of us who are part of the association are linked to sports.“.
Because the problem is in the very bowels of the stadiums and in their broadcasts. In August 2021, the regulation came into force by which games of chance were relegated to the early morning -where there is an even more vulnerable public- and that banned betting house advertising on t-shirts.
Effective therapies and social support
“Although you go out on the street and see 2,000 betting houses. It’s as if you were fighting against smoking and seeing countless companies related to this industry at all times. It must be recognized that they are legal and that they participate in the national commission against match or forum fixing, but their visibility remains. This helps to normalize the game,” analyzes María José López, from AFE, in what she calls the “double balance” in which the sport moves.
“On the one hand, we have the benefit of a business that has a lot of permeability in society. On the other hand, there are the values that are associated with it,” he explains. A clear example of assimilation is alcohol advertising, which has found a gap with names such as ‘0.0’. Hence, Declan Hill and other experts in the field demand “serious therapies, because addictions are very difficult to overcome if a player does not stop watching gambling advertisements”.
For psychologist David Peris, it is necessary to “become aware that one has an addiction and work to change some reversible ones for others. We must stimulate the opposite of, for example, gratification. The environment and social support to control the environment are essential“.
All the parties consulted conclude on the need to have an adequate debate on games of chance, recognizing its addictive nature, and involving, above all, potential victims: “We need the players who produce the data from which the gaming industry get part of the revenue so that result in better salaries, anti-gambling education and personal benefits“.
2023-12-06 05:50:41
#Gambling #addiction #silent #plague #sport #Betting #drug #footballers
