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The AFL umpire arrested after allegedly leaking Brownlow Medal votes during the 2022 season has been named, amid the league’s investigation into suspicious betting.
According to The Age, field umpire Michael Pell, who umpired 16 matches in 2022 after making his debut the year prior, was one of four arrested after betting irregularities were identified by one of the AFL’s gambling partners.
Pell had previously umpired in the Essendon District Football League, as well as in a VFL grand final, before being called in as an emergency umpire for a match in late 2021. He was then added to the AFL umpires list for 2022.
The bets were up to several thousand dollars, but the league maintains there is no suggestion of match or vote-fixing.
The AFL also remains confident that the integrity of the 2022 Brownlow Medal, which was won by Carlton captain Patrick Cripps, is not under question.
The AFL’s Brownlow Medal system sees the three field umpires congregate at the end of every match to award votes to the three best players on the ground via a 3-2-1 system.
Pell was interviewed by police on Monday, with allegations ‘a person with knowledge of the voting tally distributed the information to a group of people known to them’, according to The Age.
“Victorians are well known for their love of AFL and in particular, the prestigious Brownlow Medal award, but equally they want to know that there is integrity, fairness and honesty behind this award,” Victoria Police Intelligence and Covert Support officer Deb Robertson said in a statement.
“We have been working with the AFL and Sport Integrity Australia in relation to these matters, and we will continue to work together to target, disrupt and apprehend people who commit these offences.
“The public assistance is a really key part – we know there are people out there involved in sport who see or hear things they know are not right and we need them to speak up.
“This can also be done confidentially via CrimeStoppers.”
(Photo by Dylan Burns/AFL Photos via Getty Images)
Along with Pell, two of the three others arrested are expected to be charged with using insider information to corrupt a betting event, which could lead to a sentence of up to 10 years in prison. The fourth man has been released pending further investigation.
According to Herald Sun chief football writer Mark Robinson, the men were discovered after a betting agency’s algorithm found an account was placing regular bets on player votes and winning every time – while attempting to beat the system by also placing bets with other agencies.
“One agency was alerted to a punter or punters placing bets on players’ votes in different matches and winning every time,” Robinson wrote.
“By the end of the count, a red flag was beside his name.
“That information was given to the AFL. It cross-checked betting patterns with their other betting partners and found the same person/people had placed similar Brownlow bets with them.
“The AFL immediately knew the information could only come from one source – the umpires.
“It cross checked the betting with games and the umpires involved and it produced the one constant – Pell.”
This isn’t the first betting scandal to rock the league, with then-Collingwood player Jaidyn Stephenson suspended for 10 games and fined $20,000 after it was discovered he had been placing bets on Magpies games he was involved in.
In 2011, another Magpie Heath Shaw was banned for eight weeks and also fined $20,000 for giving $10 to a friend to bet on teammate Nick Maxwell scoring the first goal in a match against Adelaide, after learning the usual defender would be starting in the forward line.
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