Two notable footballers past and present have been charged with historic betting rule breaches.
Neil Danns, the former Crystal Palace, Leicester City and Birmingham City midfielder, was found to have placed more than 60 bets – including some on his own teams to lose – between 2007 and 2022.
He will now be banned from football for six months, which will impact upon his current job as Southport FC manager.
Elsewhere, Lewis Macari – the grandson of former Manchester United ace and legendary Stoke City manager Lou – has also been found guilty of historic betting rule breaches dating back to 2020-22.
Modest Losses
Danns, who captained Blackburn Rovers to the FA Youth Cup back in 2001, was tipped to play for England before opting to represent Guyana; the birth country of his grandfather.
Although he went on to have a nomadic career, the midfielder was highly rated and would play a part in Football League promotions for four different clubs.
The betting charges against Danns range from the period of 2007 – when he was turning out for Birmingham City in the Premier League – to 2022, when he was a veteran player in non-league with Macclesfield.
Before 2014, the Football Association’s rules on betting within football were not as strict as they are today – 62 of Danns’ 65 bets were placed prior to the law changes, which prohibited players, coaches and anyone associated with a club in the top eight tiers of the English game to have a flutter.
However, prior to 2014, players were still banned from betting on games in which they were involved – Danns wagered on his own side to win on three separate occasions and lose on two others.
A report from the Football Association Regulatory Commission revealed that he staked £2,137 on ‘mostly Saturday accumulators’, with a net loss of £1,323.
“There is no suggestion [he] was match fixing, betting with the benefit of any particular inside information or that there was any suspicious activity or betting patterns,” the report concluded.
Danns has been fined £1,000 and subjected to a six-month ban from football, although that will be suspended until the end of the 2025/26 season – allowing him to take up his position in the dugout at National League North side Southport.
More Breaches
The latest of the current professional footballers to be hauled in for questioning by the Football Association is Lewis Macari.
The 23-year-old came through the youth ranks at Stoke City, where his grandfather – Lou – is still considered a club legend after a successful period as manager.
He has since moved on to Notts County, but it was during his stint at Stoke and a loan spell at Irish side Dundalk between February 2020 and December 2022 that Macari is being investigated.
Lewis Macari has extended his loan spell with Dundalk until the end of the Premier Division season 🤝
— Stoke City FC (@stokecity) June 30, 2022
The Football Association alleges that Macari placed more than 350 bets during that period, although it’s not known if any of those involved games in which he was participating.
Either way, that’s a breach of the FA’s Rule E8:
“A participant shall not bet, either directly or indirectly, the result, progress, conduct or any other aspect of, or occurrence in or in connection with, a football match or competition.”
Macari will be given until July 18 to respond to the charges, while his current club Notts County have issued a statement.
“We will be supporting Lewis and his representatives throughout the investigation process and will be making no further comment at this stage,” it reads.
These two cases come barely a week after another EFL stalwart was banned for more than three years after betting on games in which he was playing.
Ryan Bowman, a former striker for Shrewsbury Town and Exeter City amongst other clubs, placed more than 6,000 bets during his playing career.
Of those, more than 350 were placed on games in which he was involved – something the FA’s report described as ‘egregious’ and ‘a most serious case’.
It was also reported that Bowman had placed bets while sat on the substitutes’ bench during a live game, using the accounts of friends and family in a bid to avoid detection.
More than two-dozen high profile players, including England internationals Ivan Toney, Kieran Trippier and Daniel Sturridge, have been sanctioned for breaching betting rules over the past decade.
Another, Brazilian international Lucas Paqueta, is waiting to see if he will be banned from football for life over his part in an alleged fraud that saw the West Ham forward deliberately pick up a string of bookings so that friends and family could profit at the bookies.