Chronic gambling is a personal choice... not a medical issue
Gambling in football is a topic sailed in choppy waters.
The last time I tried to tell a few home truths about the extent of the problem, Police Scotland were on the phone and threatening to press charges.
Revelations about match fixing didn’t appear to go down well with some members of the public and PC Plod launched an enquiry.
You can always put money on someone or other taking offence to a subject which splits opinion.
So here’s a few tuppence worth. It’s an opinion that obesity isn’t an illness, drug-taking and chronic gambling also don’t fall into that medical category as they all have choice as a common denominator.
It ’s general ly an indulgence and for many a sel f i sh compulsion which combines with a lack of control and creates the bigger problem.
Behavioural issues are at play, some may eat, drink or gamble l i ke there’s no tomorrow in a bid to bury other miseries going on in their lives.
But choice and a lack of control are the biggest factors. To take gambling problems into medical territory is a minefield.
There’s another epidemic which has been laid bare this week with so many desperate to climb aboard the mental health bandwagon.
First it was Hamilton boss Brian Rice coming clean about his addiction and then we had the Leigh Griffiths and Kris Boyd spat which had the average Twitter timeline bombarded with the selfcentred, look-at-me brigade.
People desperate to make themselves relevant over matters where everything becomes a mental health outcry.
As an exceptional coach and terrific guy, Rice should get nothing but best wishes on his battle with his demons but Boyd should also be allowed to question Griffiths and his professionalism without it being incendiary.
As a top-class pundit, he has suffered his own personal pain and is better qualified than most when it comes to the delicate matters of mental health, having lost a brother to suicide.
Gambling in football will never be tackled honestly given the stakes at play but let’s lift the mood with a true story.
A lower-league boss walked into Ladbrokes and scribbled out an accumulator.
He’s a local lad and well known but he also stood out in his club tracksuit.
Someone shouted to him that they’d backed his side to beat Cove Rangers that weekend.
Tongue hopefully in cheek , my managerial mate replied on his way out: “What did you do that for, I’ve just backed Cove.”
It triggered a laugh but then came the caution as he regaled the story.
Had the SFA vice police been in the vicinity or someone had taken it upon themselves to stick him in via mobile phone footage then he would have been in bother with the beaks.
It’s a safe bet to say he was one of hundreds within Scottish football having a wager on any given Saturday.
The SFA can detect and punish gamblers to their hearts’ content but their unholy alliance to betting firms is now so ingrained within footbal l that the hypocrisy stinks.
Attempting to take gambling out of dressing rooms is futile, that boat has long since sailed.