Tony Adams: Former Arsenal captain calls for football to cut ties with gambling companies
- Published
Tony Adams made 669 appearances for Arsenal, spending 14 years as club captain
Former England and Arsenal captain Tony Adams says football needs to cut its ties with gambling companies.
Adams' charity Sporting Chance, which supports athletes with mental health and addiction issues, says 70% of the addiction disorders it deals with among footballers relate to gambling.
Adams, 53, launched the charity in 2000 after himself battling alcoholism.
"As a charity we are not anti-gambling and not anti-drinking," he said. "We are very pro athlete who wants help.
"We are not involved in the politics of the gambling companies or sponsorship.
"We don't take any sponsorship from gambling or alcohol. It's not part of me. I can't be associated with something that nearly killed me.
"That would be morally wrong. When a sports person reaches out we are there to help.
"Ideally I would get the advertising out of the game because it does influence people. They spend fortunes on the ads for a reason. It's because it works.
"It normalises it and that's the issue I have got."
It comes just days after Hamilton Academical head coach Brian Rice was banned from the dugout for 10 matches after admitting to breaching Scottish FA gambling rules.
In December, Crystal Palace winger Andros Townsend said he once lost £46,000 in one night but being charged by the FA for betting "probably saved me as a human being".
Last month, sports minister Nigel Adams MP told BBC Sport that football has "far too much dependency" on sponsorship from gambling companies.
Tony Adams added that gambling in football had become a "bit of an epidemic".