Gambling and sports are a match made in heaven – at least until the form of gambling in question is sports betting and the gamblers themselves are sportsmen themselves. FIFA’s code of ethics strictly prohibits players and officials from betting on sports, and no doubt, the other governing bodies’ similar documents do the same. Make no mistake, these rules and regulations don’t ban football players, for example, from playing a few spins on a slot machine at an online casino. From this point of view, the games at the Spin Casino are pretty safe: not even a loss at its top football-inspired slot machine will have any influence on the outcome of even a training session, let alone a match.
Betting on a sporting event you’re directly involved with goes way beyond lack of sportsmanship, though – it is plain wrong. But match-fixing is still a problem, even in the EPL, a league that should stand as an example for others around the world. There are, in turn, places and leagues where these prohibited forms of gambling are endemic, much more than they are in the EPL.
Romanian football is bustling with betting scandals
The Romanian Football Federation, like all others in the world, is strictly against its members – players and officials – getting involved in sports betting as a whole, let alone betting on the matches they are involved in. The latest in the row of cases involving Romanian footballers came to light this January when a deceived lover revealed to the press the not-so-legal pursuits of her former-fiancé, a player for League 2 team Gloria Buzău.
According to the Federation’s records, this is just the latest in a row of cases involving football players and bets on their own matches – last year alone, the RFF has investigated almost a dozen cases, and those are only the ones that were revealed.
According to sources interviewed by local sports publication DigiSport, betting is especially widespread among the younger generations of players – and the main culprits for this phenomenon are often the clubs themselves.
The wages are small but at least late…
In Romania, sports betting has become one of the national pastimes over the last few decades. Before the fall of the Communist regime, the national lottery offered 1×2 bets to the public – after 1989, though, bookmakers from all over the world have gained access to the local market, flooding the airwaves with advertising and opening betting shops all over the country. With so much temptation surrounding them, it’s no wonder the youngsters are giving in, a veteran League 1 footballer told the journalists. But there is one thing that makes it easier for them to step off the straight and narrow: the wages paid by clubs to younger players are not only small but often late, too.
The RFF’s Integrity Department is continuously running campaigns against the widespread phenomenon of betting by footballers… but it’s not enough, it seems, as the practice is ongoing as we speak.
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