So for allegedly getting a couple of Yellow Cards, they send SWAT in. Clayton must be a really dangerous fella at 5'2" and a real threat. I have no issues with players being arrested or asked to come in for interviews but really? The way the Cops over there handled this - with convenient photographic releases makes this look like extreme overkill. I wonder if they treat politicians and corrupt white collar executives the same? This isn't Mr Asia all over again. And amazingly, this all goes down just before two major semi finals. They could have either done this weeks ago or in a couple of weeks time. The whole thing smells - from both sides of the story.
Perhaps banning sports betting and sports betting adverts on shirts might be a decent course of action.
High chance that Davila and/or Lewis were planning on travelling to their home countries, so the Police couldn’t wait.
Their lawyers are probably telling them to be quiet. But, the only thing close to a statement from the players is the statement from the Macarthur CEO who said he talked to Uli and Uli is upset that he did it. So, it seems at least one of them has admitted to being guilty.
So for allegedly getting a couple of Yellow Cards, they send SWAT in. Clayton must be a really dangerous fella at 5'2" and a real threat. I have no issues with players being arrested or asked to come in for interviews but really? The way the Cops over there handled this - with convenient photographic releases makes this look like extreme overkill. I wonder if they treat politicians and corrupt white collar executives the same? This isn't Mr Asia all over again. And amazingly, this all goes down just before two major semi finals. They could have either done this weeks ago or in a couple of weeks time. The whole thing smells - from both sides of the story.
Perhaps banning sports betting and sports betting adverts on shirts might be a decent course of action.
High chance that Davila and/or Lewis were planning on travelling to their home countries, so the Police couldn’t wait.
Yeah, the idea that the police would delay an arrest until after the final is insane, as soon as they were in a position to arrest them they would have. They wouldn't delay to disrupt the final and they wouldn't wait until after it.
Imagine if some AFL loving cop decided to delay the arrest because he wanted to prevent any good football publicity, only to miss the players as they returned home. He'd lose his job.
The timing sucked, but the reason they moved now was to catch the players before they went into their offseason hollidays and not anything with the finals.
Spoken by someone who's never had the cops raid their house or someone they love.
No support at all to the spot-fixers, and the photo of Clayton in his undies was kind of funny, but the cops are generally out of control where-ever you go in the world and need to be reminded that they're public servants, not paramilitary overlords.
" According to Australian reports, Davila has been the orchestrator of the scandal, as perhaps an explanation of Lewis’ involvement.
The Herald understands the 33-year-old played a role in Lewis’ transfer from the Phoenix to Macarthur FC at the start of the current A-League season, in order to reunite with his former teammate.
The pair shared a dressing room together for a season with the Phoenix, before Davila left for Australia. "
How many times do we see senior players abuse their mentorship roles like this?
Spoken by someone who's never had the cops raid their house or someone they love.
No support at all to the spot-fixers, and the photo of Clayton in his undies was kind of funny, but the cops are generally out of control where-ever you go in the world and need to be reminded that they're public servants, not paramilitary overlords.
Yep, but also leaking photos and names seems unnecessary, New Zealands rules around name suppression can be problematic, but in the age of the internet I think it's best to have privacy until a conviction. Even if Lewis is found innocent and had no involvement in it, the stigma of this will follow him forever and will likely hamper his career.
I also thought it seemed excessive and wondered if its an election year for someone who wants to demonstrate they're cracking down on crime. Still, I'd expect the presence of photographers would make it less likely for any excessive force to be used.
Out of interest, who were the Kingz/Knights players with records?
Spoken by someone who's never had the cops raid their house or someone they love.
No support at all to the spot-fixers, and the photo of Clayton in his undies was kind of funny, but the cops are generally out of control where-ever you go in the world and need to be reminded that they're public servants, not paramilitary overlords.
Yep, but also leaking photos and names seems unnecessary, New Zealands rules around name suppression can be problematic, but in the age of the internet I think it's best to have privacy until a conviction. Even if Lewis is found innocent and had no involvement in it, the stigma of this will follow him forever and will likely hamper his career.
As I've said elsewhere, the NSW guidelines on name suppression make it clear that the identities of those accused of crimes are not suppressed except for good reason, and "embarrassment to the accused if they're found not guilty" is not considered a good reason.
Would you have preferred that the entire operation be kept secret? Because I don't see how you could do a spot-fixing bust on the A-League (or any major sports league) and keep it secret. There are only about (does quick maths) 250 people who it could possibly be, and even if photos weren't put out you could work it out by elimination quite quickly. Even if you didn't name the club you'd have a 1-in-12 chance of guessing right.
Spoken by someone who's never had the cops raid their house or someone they love.
No support at all to the spot-fixers, and the photo of Clayton in his undies was kind of funny, but the cops are generally out of control where-ever you go in the world and need to be reminded that they're public servants, not paramilitary overlords.
Yep, but also leaking photos and names seems unnecessary, New Zealands rules around name suppression can be problematic, but in the age of the internet I think it's best to have privacy until a conviction. Even if Lewis is found innocent and had no involvement in it, the stigma of this will follow him forever and will likely hamper his career.
As I've said elsewhere, the NSW guidelines on name suppression make it clear that the identities of those accused of crimes are not suppressed except for good reason, and "embarrassment to the accused if they're found not guilty" is not considered a good reason.
Would you have preferred that the entire operation be kept secret? Because I don't see how you could do a spot-fixing bust on the A-League (or any major sports league) and keep it secret. There are only about (does quick maths) 250 people who it could possibly be, and even if photos weren't put out you could work it out by elimination quite quickly. Even if you didn't name the club you'd have a 1-in-12 chance of guessing right.
I'd have preferred for it to be kept secret until they were found guilty, yes. Once guilty, go for gold.
It would be problematic to keep it secret, but it would just be unfounded speculation and in the off season they won't be playing football anyway. If they were in season then it would be different again.
It's just tough in the age of the internet to be wrongly accused. Embarrassment is one thing, but having your entire career destroyed based on a wrong accusation is a very real possibility if one of the players is found innocent.
Saying that, the nature of the operation and the fact that they know the specific sums paid shows that it's pretty likely the players are guilty, so the opinion likely dooesn't apply here. But, overseas there have been occasions where people have committed suicide because of the online bullying based on accusations and leaked police arrest videos.
Somewhat agree, corruption that gets tracked back to cartels isn't exactly taken lightly by law enforcement, and it's not their job to find sympathy for poor little Clayton in his undies.
It's very much a matter of play stupid games and win stupid prizes.
I've held the belief that athletes that do dumb shark are probably just bored as hell with their routines and statistically bound to fudge up in some capacity.
I also think that releasing those pictures and videos were extremely unnecessary and at the very least delayed or used in court. Why does the public need to see that crap? I don't say this because I think they don't deserve it but rather, they haven't been convicted yet and they have family that was be horrified seeing that. I do think the police were taking advantage of the potential headlines a bit there.
" According to Australian reports, Davila has been the orchestrator of the scandal, as perhaps an explanation of Lewis’ involvement.
The Herald understands the 33-year-old played a role in Lewis’ transfer from the Phoenix to Macarthur FC at the start of the current A-League season, in order to reunite with his former teammate.
The pair shared a dressing room together for a season with the Phoenix, before Davila left for Australia. "
How many times do we see senior players abuse their mentorship roles like this?
Lewis is 27. He ain't a kid. Been in the international scene since about age 20, and pro football the same amount of time. I'm presuming that the APL and/or clubs run programs, making sure the players are aware that match/spot fixing is illegal. The players would have signed contracts with the right clauses etc.
Innocent until proven guilty, but being greedy & stupid ain't a defence. However if he is found guilty, I think a life ban would be too harsh - based on the little we know so far.
We can argue about how the Aus police have handled this arrest all we want, but at the end of it, all we know is that 3 players with connections to some south amercian gambling group have been arrested. I assume the aussies had some idea of who the connection is and reacted accordingly. It's not unheard of for footballers to have access to drugs, guns and other dagerous items and why should footballers be treated any differently to other suspects.
"I'd have preferred for it to be kept secret until they were found guilty, yes. "
Secret trials don't have a good reputation
I used the wrong language and you also willfully misinterpreted the meaning, what I meant was people were not identified publicly until the trial was over, not that the trial itself should be secret.
What I think is we live in a culture where we have witch hunts and there have been instances of vigilante justice and people being bullied to the point where their lives have been ruined or have ended. So, we probably need to address how we do justice in the age of social media.
I think Lewis is likely guilty and if found guilty he should be named, but I feel that if he's innocent the stigma of the accusations will follow him for the rest of his career.
So, say someone gets falsely accused stealing money from their employer, goes to trial, and get exonerated because the company used the same accounting software as the British post. Despite being innocent, that accusation may still be online. If that person is going for a job and the choice is between them and another candidate then the employer will likely use google to look at social media, etc. to make sure they're a good cultural fit. If it shows that the person was falsely accused of fraud, then the employer will choose the other candidate because why risk it. In the past only people who knew the person would know they were falsely accused, I don't know how court records are published, but the false accusation would be harder to find, now you can find them with a few key presses.
There needs to be transparency in justice, but the innocent should also be protected and I can't think of a better way to protect the future of someone who is innocent in the age of internet than name suppression, but I'd be very happy to be proven wrong.
That is not to say that our system is good, because it's clearly abused.
I agree with a lot of comments here. They call the swat team out to deal with some guys who got intentional cards for $$$. When the gangs are running around small town NZ and you get 10 years max for serious crimes. It seems overkill to me...
BUT part of me is thinking maybe there is more to it. Maybe Davilla has been doing this much longer than reported and big $$$ is involved?
Seems so stupid for Lewis to do this for JUST $10k... so again I think maybe there is more money than is being reported.
Surprised with your stance given your occupationLG
So for allegedly getting a couple of Yellow Cards, they send SWAT in. Clayton must be a really dangerous fella at 5'2" and a real threat. I have no issues with players being arrested or asked to come in for interviews but really? The way the Cops over there handled this - with convenient photographic releases makes this look like extreme overkill. I wonder if they treat politicians and corrupt white collar executives the same? This isn't Mr Asia all over again. And amazingly, this all goes down just before two major semi finals. They could have either done this weeks ago or in a couple of weeks time. The whole thing smells - from both sides of the story.
Perhaps banning sports betting and sports betting adverts on shirts might be a decent course of action.
This is interesting if true about Davila being active in the Lewis transfer. Expect a couple things going forward people (believe me, I know what I’m talking about here). 1. Their time at our club will be looked at closely and betting patterns looked at (which is how many of these scandals are identified in the first place or used as a falsehood to protect/disguise the use of an informant). 2. Remember that the 4 of these guys will all be interviewed by the cops and there are very good odds that more dishonesty will be revealed by them for the same reasons that usual criminals turn on each other when caught. Doloras
Anyway, back on topic:
" According to Australian reports, Davila has been the orchestrator of the scandal, as perhaps an explanation of Lewis’ involvement.
The Herald understands the 33-year-old played a role in Lewis’ transfer from the Phoenix to Macarthur FC at the start of the current A-League season, in order to reunite with his former teammate.
The pair shared a dressing room together for a season with the Phoenix, before Davila left for Australia. "
How many times do we see senior players abuse their mentorship roles like this?
Justice must be seen to be done…… an old tenet of our justice system which probably hasn’t aged well like so much in this modern world. The internet has certainly caused a lot of upheaval with how the old ways worked and what the public now wants to see.Doloras
"I'd have preferred for it to be kept secret until they were found guilty, yes. "
I believe that generally there should be name suppression until a conviction. But publication of a person’s name can often lead to further similar offences being discovered, usually by the name being recognised and victims coming forward. It is not an easy process to navigate/justify as most circumstances differ from each other in some way. an example is sex cases where, even on conviction, the offender often has continued suppression as to not do so, identifies the victim (usually in family related offending). From my observations over the years, the current practise usually works. Where it doesn’t, it is usually because of an interpretation by judges/police/etc which goes against both common sense and the original intent of the kegislation.Ryan
What I think is we live in a culture where we have witch hunts and there have been instances of vigilante justice and people being bullied to the point where their lives have been ruined or have ended. So, we probably need to address how we do justice in the age of social media.
I think Lewis is likely guilty and if found guilty he should be named, but I feel that if he's innocent the stigma of the accusations will follow him for the rest of his career.
So, say someone gets falsely accused stealing money from their employer, goes to trial, and get exonerated because the company used the same accounting software as the British post. Despite being innocent, that accusation may still be online. If that person is going for a job and the choice is between them and another candidate then the employer will likely use google to look at social media, etc. to make sure they're a good cultural fit. If it shows that the person was falsely accused of fraud, then the employer will choose the other candidate because why risk it. In the past only people who knew the person would know they were falsely accused, I don't know how court records are published, but the false accusation would be harder to find, now you can find them with a few key presses.
There needs to be transparency in justice, but the innocent should also be protected and I can't think of a better way to protect the future of someone who is innocent in the age of internet than name suppression, but I'd be very happy to be proven wrong.
That is not to say that our system is good, because it's clearly abused.
Don't know how true it is, but I saw on Reddit someone said that the betting wasn't on yellows for individual players, but yellows for the team as a whole. Could very well be that Clayton was unlucky enough to get a yellow in the wrong games which put him under suspicion.
Edit, looking at the stats on Transfermarket this is the yellow history for the players over the last three seasons: Uli: 2021/22: 1 2022/23: 1 2023/24: 4
Baccus: 2021/22: 1 2022/23: 6 2023/24: 7
Clayton: 2021/22: 2 2022/23: 2 2023/24: 5
So the current season is a big outlier for both Uli and Clay which is either evidence or could make the authorities think there is a pattern when he's just had a pretty ill disciplined season.
I also thought it seemed excessive and wondered if its an election year for someone who wants to demonstrate they're cracking down on crime. Still, I'd expect the presence of photographers would make it less likely for any excessive force to be used.
Out of interest, who were the Kingz/Knights players with records?
Interesting n 2022 Stratford Town defender Kynan Isaac was banned for 10 years for his part in spot-fixing during an FA Cup tie in which it was alleged he deliberately got booked as part of a betting scheme with friends
