On May 17 this year, Ivan Toney, the Brentford striker, got banned from all football and football-related activity for eight months by the Football Association (FA) for breaching their betting rules a whopping 262 times. Recently, the FA published a detailed report on Ivan Toney’s ban, showcasing the charges of his case.
It was revealed that the footballer bet on matches involving his own team and had he not been diagnosed with a gambling addiction, his eight-month ban could have gotten much longer. Toney’s ban runs up until January 16 of next year, but he can take part in training with his club during the last four months of his ban commencing from September 17 of this year.
The charges behind Ivan Toney’s eight-month ban according to the FA report are as under:
- 126 bets were in respect of matches in a competition in which Toney’s club had participated or were eligible to participate in that particular season.
- Of those 126 bets, 29 bets or instructions to bet were in respect of the club that Toney was registered with or on loan with at the time.
- Of those 29 bets, there were 16 bets on Toney’s own team to win 15 different matches. Toney played in 11 of these games and was an unused substitute in another game.
- Of those 29 bets, there were 13 bets on Toney’s own team to lose in 7 different matches between 22 August 2017 and 3 March 2018. Toney did not play in any of those matches. Of the 13 bets, 11 were against Newcastle whilst Toney was on loan at another club. The other 2 bets related to a game between Wigan v Aston Villa whilst the player was on loan at Wigan but he was not part of the squad.
- A further 15 of the 126 bets or instructions to bet were placed by Toney to score in 9 different matches all of which he played in. All of those 15 bets or instructions to bet were initiated by Toney at a time when it would not have been public knowledge that he was starting or playing in the fixture.
- In addition, there were 6 bets on particular occurrences during a match not involving Toney.
- There was also a breach of FA Rule E8.2 namely an inside information charge whereby on 29 March 2018 Toney informed a friend he would be starting in his club’s next match. The circumstances in which this information was provided are unclear. It is said on behalf of the player not to really amount to inside information because everyone would have known he was likely to play. However, Toney has accepted it as a breach.