We are in a right pickle, make no mistake. The suggested punishments for footballers implicated in betting ‘scandals’ have escalated sharply in the last few months, from Ayatollah Whately’s call for year-long bans to now, if you can believe it, imprisonment.
The electric chair is surely next.
Assuming that reports are accurate, our latest offender, Nathan Bock, told a friend and a family member what position he was likely to play in an upcoming match. Does this sound like a crime worthy of time in the big house to you?
One scarcely knows where to start with the perversity of the situation but let’s start with some basics. Bookmaking is a risky business. You win some, you lose some. Betting on live creatures (as opposed to roulette wheels) means that intelligence is king.
Until ruined by cash-strapped state governments, this was what made betting on horses fun. Bookmakers always knew and accepted that when they put up a price for a nag they were pitting their knowledge against the punter’s.
They also knew that people with knowledge about the horse would be among those wiling to wager for or against the conveyance. If someone had better intelligence, that was life.
The bizarre idea that racing authorities might create laws to stop this from happening would have struck anyone as a fundamental misunderstanding of the game everyone was playing.
So now the AFL is fining footballers in order to protect the profits of betting agencies? For talking to their mates? You can see where this is heading; players implanted with hidden microphones to make sure that, even on the conjugal pillow, they never divulge news of a painful in-grown toenail or rumours of discontent in the ranks.
In passing, parallels here with governments bailing out insufficiently prudent financial institutions around the world are hard to ignore.
Nobody held a gun to the heads of bank managers and said ”You lend a million bucks to this unemployed garbologist or say goodnight.” And yet when they did their dough it was taxpayer money that saved their skins.
In the same way, it was only the AFL’s eye for a quick dollar that has ushered in wall-to-wall football betting. There was no public outcry for more gambling.
If they had so chosen, the AFL could have said to the betting agencies “Sorry boys. Betting updates every five minutes on televised games is just not a look we want for our game.”
But no. So when the inevitable happens, and some poor bookie gets stung because he was brave or silly enough to offer a price that was too good to pass up, it’s the player who is to blame?
I guess there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell of it happening but there are surely untested legal questions that, if pursued, might find against the right of the AFL to impose these outrageous penalties.
At any rate, in what moral universe is a player talking to a mate about his footy a greater crime than what the AFL and its gaming buddies are doing to football?
If the AFL is comfortable with ubiquitous ‘exotic’ gambling on football then a certain number of night-follows-day things flow from this.
One of these is that every little bit of information about the preparation of athletes and teams is now worth money. This is how it always was in racing and nobody squealed.
The AFL appears willing to accept all of the benefit – that is, cash – that comes with embracing a gambling culture but none of the risks. The risks are, of course, obvious and the AFL’s ever-more-convincing imitations of the pigs in Orwell’s Animal Farm do not change this.
So listen carefully Mr Demetriou: a betting culture means that sometimes bookmakers will lose and sometimes players will bet on games. History tells us that these are cast-iron givens. The more squeamish among players who enjoy a flutter will find friends to place their bets but it will still happen.
It is true enough that we live increasingly in a world that seems less comfortable with the idea that life involves risk. But we’re talking about bookmaking here; a time-honoured line of work, passed down over generations, inhabited by brave men and women who were prepared to take their bruises when they came.
And yet our risk-averse culture, or parts of it, seems not able even to understand that gambling is nothing without risk and the currency of risk is, yes, information.
It is not Nathan Bock’s fault that the AFL has embraced gambling. Why should he and other players be made to pay for this decision? And why should they now be placed in a position in which casual utterances to friends and acquaintances can cost them the money they have honestly earned?
It is now only a matter of time before the current flirtation with rampant gambling in Australian sports blows up in the faces of those who made it happen. The clock counting down to the mother of all betting scandals is now ticking.
When it happens the people who run professional sport will first maintain their innocence, point the finger at the individuals involved as being bad eggs, and then eventually admit they probably went too far too quickly.
What then will history say about the custodians of our sports? It is true that holding back the tide of internet and mobile phone gambling would have been difficult, probably impossible. But this doesn’t mean that sport needed to bend over backwards to help bookmakers make more money.
If we are to have gambling on sport, let’s at least have real gambling in which people accept the inherent risks. And let us not scapegoat players for the decisions of others.
Michael Gard
Roar Rookie
Fair point. As sometimes happens, the Roar chooses its own title for these articles, which is their right. I didn't mention hypocrisy in my original article. But I guess you could say that on the one hand the AFL are pushing gambling while punishing people for being involved. That seems pretty hypocritical to me.
Johnny onehammer
Guest
Only players nominated as forwards can be on bookie sheets as first goal kicker. Problem solved. If a back or mid kicks first then it still goes to the first forward to kick a goal even if it's the teams second or fifth Wake up clowns -- Comment left via The Roar's iPhone app. Download The Roar's iPhone App in the App Store here.
Johnny onehammer
Guest
What's with the prison sentence? Surely this kind of thing deserves a firing squad. Me thinks the afl are going overboard Even if the player tells a mate or mum or dad that they will play forward big deal. This doesn't mean he will kick the first goal. Seems the greedy bookies want to have more of an advantage than normal. They don't give money back if you back someone to kick first goal and then they line up in back line or on the pine do they? It's all a guessing game and if they were serious about the issue they would take that kind of betting off the market. But they won't ,why? Because the greedy pricks make a fortune from this kind of betting. Take it off your books or shut the hell up We all know if the odds come in then they investigate. So what stops player telling a family member who then gets a Nate to put the bet on for him. When asked why he put the bet on he can just say it was a hunch Nothing to do with family or the player. Just joe blo from down the road. But under the table he gives the bloke his money. How do you stop that. Punters are fighting with one hand behind there backs against a multiple billion .thats billions with a B and they are squabbling over some bloke getting the inside running on a player going forward with 10 buck bets. What's the diff between an owner telling you his horse is flying and will win or run close when at big odds. No diff just different sport. Stick it bookies you greedy swines. Hope the punter gets some of his own back. -- Comment left via The Roar's iPhone app. Download The Roar's iPhone App in the App Store here.
brendan
Guest
So if a backmen or on-baller answers to the question how was training ? not bad missed a few shots at goal our chf was in the medical room and you back him to kick the first goal and he does is the player in trouble.It seems the first goal is the taboo bet so perhaps a way around it is for the tab to quote prices on the forwards and all other players are in the other category so any positinal changes dont reflect in such high odds.The Afl ,particularly Adrian Anderson ,are too extreme in there actions .There are two components to this problem the person making the bet and the agency taking the bet ,too focus only on how the bet was generated is short sighted.
The Cattery
Roar Guru
Jack I guess the author is arguing that the AFL is being hypocritical by coming down heavy on Bock for telling his mates he's playing in a different position on the weekend (a pretty minor offence in the scheme of things), while encouraging gambling houses to profit from the game. There is an argument that the business of being a bookie is such that it's actually bad luck if a punter is privy to better info than the bookie, because ultimately he is making money by being more knowledgeable about the game than the punters, and framing a market that is likely to deliver him a profit. From that perspective - what has Bock done wrong? He still had to win the footy and roost it from 60m playing for the bottom team. The AFL's action is about safe-guarding the image of the game, to make sure there is as much distance as they can engender between the players and the punters - but the charge of hypocrisy can come in at that point because the AFL is encouraging those same punters to get heavily involved in the game - it's quite a balancing act, one that is likely to go a bit askew at least once per season.
Jack Russell
Roar Guru
Not sure where the hypocrisy is. The AFL aren't saying one thing and doing something else. Bock is desperately unlucky and it does seem silly that he can't talk to his family about footy. Might not be fair, but that's not hypocrisy from the AFL.
Stu
Guest
I wonder if betting agencies report large unusual bets that don't pay out. -- Comment left via The Roar's iPhone app. Download The Roar's iPhone App in the App Store here.
The Cattery
Roar Guru
That's a fair enough question, and the answer is partly: a dumb friend. These friends got lucky this time - but even with overblown odds, a bet on Bock to kick the opening goal, especially when roosted from 60m out on the run, is hardly the action of an intelligent person.
Jesse G.
Guest
The question that no one seems to be asking but that absolutely must be considered is what kind of family and friends spend money on these prop bets with the knowledge that they have just taken advantage of the confidences that have been shared with them by a family member or close friend? When you now add in the severe sanctions doled out to players who pass along information that is then used by family members and friends to gain an advantage over oddsmakers, one has to question whether these people really deserve to be called friends. In other words, in my opinion the problem is with the friends and family who use the information to their personal advantage not with the player who does what anyone does with their friends and family by telling them about what has gone on at their job.
The Cattery
Roar Guru
Good article, well argued and written. In relation to Bock, I have made a similar argument in recent days that it's asking quite a lot no to expect footballers to talk footy with family and friends, as they have always done. Whether the AFL has moved too far to quickly in relation to embracing gambling revenue, I don't know, I still hold the view that it's better to have it out in the open than underground, and if gambling money is floating around, as it inevitably will, then the sport putting on the show deserves a cut of the action. But I do agree that a huge scandal is waiting to happen, or at least something perceived as dubious that will tarnish the reputation of the game. Thankfully, the Bock incident is nothing more than passing on valuable inside info that made the bookies' odds look extremely valuable, although personally, I'd never place a bet on any player being the first goal kicker, because their are more contenders than are racing in the Melbourne cup. But I note that those unfamiliar with the game, or who wish to be mischievous, will try to equate Bock's actions with a form of match fixing - and that's the real danger behind all of this.