EFL chairman Rick Parry has defended football’s right to benefit from responsible betting sponsorship and accepts there are no “magic answers” to eradicating addiction issues among players.
The sport’s relationship with gambling has been in the spotlight again recently after a 10-month ban was imposed on Newcastle midfielder Sandro Tonali by the Italian Football Federation late last month.
The player, who is suffering from a gambling addiction according to his agent, is also being investigated over possible breaches of betting rules in England by the Football Association.
The Big Step campaign, part of the Gambling With Lives charity, said the player deserved “empathy and support” rather than a heavy sanction, adding: “Sending someone addicted to gambling into this environment is like sending an alcoholic to work in a pub. If you force young footballers to endorse addictive products then don’t be surprised if they use them.”
Parry, whose organisation signed a new deal with Sky Bet as its title sponsor in June through to 2029, told the PA news agency that betting companies had made “billions” of pounds out of sport since the introduction of the Gambling Act in 2005 and added: “It’s only fair that there is a way of channelling some of that revenue into sport.
“So enabling sport to negotiate marketing agreements to get a share of the billions that are flowing in is something I have no difficulty with whatsoever as a concept.
“We’ve commissioned research, we’ve looked extensively and we haven’t seen any evidence that sponsorship leads to an increase in gambling or gambling harm.
“The values of gambling in England have been fairly steady across the decades and there is no direct correlation between sponsorship and gambling harm.
“Nobody wants gambling harm, nobody wants players to become addicted, or indeed non-players. But it is two different issues that tend to get conflated in terms of what we are doing with players and indeed with the non players.”
The EFL’s partnership with Sky Bet was singled out for praise in the Government’s white paper on gambling reform published in April as an example of the sort of socially responsible agreement sports should strive for.
Since 2018, Sky Bet funding has supported the EPIC Risk Awareness programme which has provided education to players and staff at all 72 EFL clubs. The programme has reached 2,200 players and staff over the past two years.
Sky Bet’s parent company Flutter will also put £20million into wider research, education and treatment this year alone.
“Behaving responsibly is incredibly important,” Parry added.
“Educating players is something that we’ve been doing for at least the last five years and we’ll continue to do more of that.
“(But) that frankly is never going to stop individuals from wanting to gamble. Ten per cent of people gamble – they always will.
“It is a fact of life, prohibition doesn’t work, so what you have to do is have a framework, that you educate, you behave responsibly, you do everything you can to minimise harm, but eliminating it is incredibly difficult.
“If we didn’t have Sky Bet sponsorship we would still have players betting – they always have, they always will.
“Our responsibility is to try to make sure that we support and that we educate – it’s not just about punishment. As we’ve seen pretty graphically in Italy recently, it’s not just been about identifying punishment, it’s identifying that some of the players have genuine addiction problems. It’s how you assist in rehabilitation as well as punishment, and there are no magic answers.
“It’s a problem that will continue to exist. We have to try to tackle it and address it, without in any way pretending it’s not there.
“But that said, that absolutely shouldn’t preclude us from entering into responsible and sensible marketing arrangements when gambling operators are making a huge amount of money out of sport, and have been encouraged to do so by successive governments.”
Sky Bet will also commit £1million a year to the Building Foundations Fund which will support the community organisations linked to the 72 EFL clubs.
This week is a designated ‘EFL Week of Action’ to highlight the social benefit provided by club community organisations in the towns and cities they serve.
St. Louis City v Chicago Fire: Carnell warns against complacency amid unbeaten run
Bradley Carnell has warned his St. Louis City side they can't get comfortable despite a four-game unbeaten run.
Carnell's men last lost in March, since winning one and drawing three to leave St. Louis ninth in the Western Conference, just three points behind sixth-placed Austin FC.
As his team prepares to host the Chicago Fire this weekend, Carnell has cautioned his players not to become complacent.
"We can speak so many nice positives, especially with our three clean sheets in four and there are so many good moments," Carnell said.
"But I also don't want to get comfortable with that. I don't want to be used to getting draws. I don't want to hype up getting ties."
Carnell's side will look to extend their unbeaten run against a Fire team winless in four, currently 13th in the East after a poor start.
Chicago head coach Frank Klopas hopes his team don't lose faith, telling reporters: "Our focus is to continue to stay positive with the group.
"It's a process of evaluating and looking at how we can improve as a team, and then making sure once we analyse the games we look at certain things we did well and our mistakes to look to improve.
"It's a long season. I feel the team has been playing well, but we have to find a way to get points."
PLAYERS TO WATCH
St. Louis City – Joao Klauss
No St. Louis player has managed more MLS goal contributions than Klauss so far this term, scoring three and adding an assist. He will likely lead the line on Saturday and will hope to score the goals that start turning draws into wins.
Chicago Fire – Brian Gutierrez
Despite his team's poor collective start, 20-year-old midfielder Gutierrez has performed well and leads his team with three MLS goals so far this season, while also registering an assist. He will look to build on that and try to turn his side's fortunes around, starting this Saturday.
MATCH PREDICTION – ST. LOUIS WIN
St. Louis have kept clean sheets in three of their last four matches, including in the scoreless draw with the Houston Dynamo last time out. St. Louis had managed just two clean sheets in their previous 23 matches in all competitions dating back to last July.
The Fire, meanwhile, have failed to score in four straight matches. This is the fifth time Chicago have gone four or more consecutive league matches without scoring since the start of the 2021 season.
Six of St. Louis City's last eight matches have ended in draws, but home advantage should be enough to see off a struggling Chicago team on Saturday.
OPTA WIN PROBABILITY
St. Louis: 55.5%
Chicago: 19%
Draw: 25.5%
LA Galaxy v Real Salt Lake: Vanney encouraged ahead of top-of-the-table tussle
Greg Vanney believes the LA Galaxy are in a good spot both physically and mentally ahead of Saturday's clash with fellow Western Conference high-fliers Real Salt Lake.
The Galaxy sit third in the West through 11 matches of the season, though they have failed to win back-to-back road games against Austin FC (0-2) and the Seattle Sounders (0-0).
They are, however, unbeaten in all four of their home league games this term (two wins, two draws), and Vanney is looking forward to returning to Dignity Health Sports Park next time out.
"Physically, first and foremost, we're in a pretty good spot. We have a few guys coming back from issues that were pretty minor," Vanney said.
"It's good. We've been able to stay in that space for a while and now we're going into a busy part of the schedule we can make some choices about how we want to attack the week.
"Where are we mentally? We're good. It's nice to be home, it's a challenge to play a lot of games on the road early doors.
"We like the spot we're in and we want to keep building, but we've got to get through this tough stretch of games."
Real Salt Lake are top of the Western standings with 21 points, only losing twice in 11 league games this year.
However, they were dumped out of the U.S. Open Cup by New Mexico United on Wednesday, Pablo Mastroeni shuffling his pack for a 4-2 road loss.
"We completely tuned out," Mastroeni said after watching his team go 2-0 down within 20 minutes.
"The emotion is like, 'poor me,' and when you operate from that space, you can never think reasonably."
PLAYERS TO WATCH
LA Galaxy – Gabriel Pec
The Galaxy (12 shots) and Seattle (19) combined for 31 shots in their scoreless draw last time out.
Pec – who has two goals in 10 league appearances since joining the Galaxy in the offseason – recorded six of his team's attempts, but only hit the target once. He will be targeting an improvement here.
Real Salt Lake – Cristian Arango
Arango is the first Real Salt Lake player to contribute to at least one goal in five straight regular-season away matches, recording four goals and five assists during his streak.
He is just the second player since the start of last season to record a goal contribution in five straight MLS away matches, after the Columbus Crew's Cucho Hernandez.
MATCH PREDICTION – LA GALAXY WIN
The Galaxy have lost only one of their last 13 home matches against Real Salt Lake (nine wins, three draws) including going unbeaten through the last seven in a row.
The last two meetings in Carson have both ended level, though, after the Galaxy won nine of the previous 11 (one draw, one defeat).
However, Vanney's team have only lost one of their last 14 regular-season home matches dating back to last June, winning six and drawing six while averaging 2.2 goals per game throughout this run.
OPTA WIN PROBABILITY
LA Galaxy – 44.8%
Real Salt Lake – 27.8%
Draw – 27.4%
Leverkusen reach Europa League final and stretch unbeaten run with late show
Bayer Leverkusen reached the Europa League final and stretched their remarkable unbeaten run to 49 games on Thursday, Josip Stanisic scoring seven minutes into stoppage time in a dramatic 2-2 draw with Roma.
Having won last week's first leg 2-0 in Italy, Leverkusen were strong favourites to advance to this month's final in Dublin, though two Leandro Paredes penalties left them facing up to the prospect of extra time.
Paredes halved Leverkusen's aggregate lead on the stroke of half-time after Jonathan Tah fouled Sardar Azmoun, then repeated the trick following a bizarre handball from Adam Hlozek shortly after the hour mark.
However, Roma's hearts were broken as goalkeeper Mile Svilar – who was otherwise outstanding – failed to claim a routine corner and it bounced in off the unfortunate Gianluca Mancini with eight minutes of the 90 remaining.
Rather than sitting back at 2-1 up in the tie, Leverkusen chased a leveller in order to preserve their unbeaten record across all competitions this season.
It was yet another last-gasp effort that kept that record intact, with Stanisic firing into the bottom-left corner after being played through by Granit Xhaka.
Xabi Alonso's team are now unbeaten in 49 games in all competitions, breaking Benfica's previous European top-tier record of 48 matches, set between 1963 and 1965.
Leverkusen will face another Italian side in the showpiece game, after Atalanta crushed Marseille 3-0 in Bergamo to seal a 4-1 aggregate win in the other semi-final.
In-form striker Gianluca Scamacca had already rattled the crossbar when La Dea took the lead, with Ademola Lookman's strike deflecting in off the unfortunate Samuel Gigot.
Lookman then turned provider as Atalanta stretched their advantage seven minutes after the break, teeing up Matteo Ruggeri for a rasping finish into the top-right corner.
Gian Piero Gasperini's men were able to add some gloss to the scoreline at the death, with El Bilal Toure's pinpoint finish giving Pau Lopez no chance to round off a dominant win.
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