Juventus midfielder Nicolo Fagioli has been suspended for seven months for illegal gambling but some of his comments shed light on shocking details around his gambling addiction issue.
While the case became public only recently, it was being investigated in the background for many weeks prior. La Repubblica state that on the 25th of May, 2023, the Italian spoke to his therapist (Paolo Jarre) about his addiction problem and this was when he was due to pay many people around and close to him.
The details have emerged from the conversations the midfielder had with the Prosecutor, which came after his initial conversations with the Turin prosecutor in June 2023. To Prosecutor Giuseppe Chine in September, Fagioli revealed that hee initially bet on tennis. But from September 2022 onwards, he realised that he had large sums to pay to people and that is when he shifted to football as well, essentially enlarging his space.
By September 2022, Fagioli had racked up a debt of €250k. By then, his mother had noticed the problem and told her to seek help. But with time, the debts increased. Fagioli even bet on Serie B games and lower division Italian games. In September this year, Fagioli’s debt was at €3 million and he himself did the math for Chine. He was in a debt of €110k with Betar.bet and specialbet.bet, €1.5m debt with bulletbet23.com and €1.3 with another platform. He was under a debt of €31k with an illegal betting counter in Pordenone.
He also revealed that he constantly received threats and abuse. At one point, someone he owed money to threatened him by saying: ‘I’ll break your legs’. Despite his mother constantly keeping an eye on his account, the debts kept on growing.
Fagioli also revealed that he also got money from teammates Federico Gatti and Radu Dragusin. He got €40k from Gatti, stating that he wanted to buy a watch but his mother had blocked his account. He never revealed his real problems to his teammates.
The midfielder stated that he started betting during an Under-21s training camp and it was Sandro Tonali who told him about an illegal website called Icebet. Tonali himself made him register with an account on the website and a person later contacted him, asking him to starting betting using a link.
Amidst mental health troubles, Fagioli broke down after he was taken off during Juventus’ game against Sassuolo and that is when it threatened to spill over.
Kaustubh Pandey | GIFN
