Ex-footballer Paul Merson and YouTuber Jack ‘Pieface’ McDermott are urging anyone struggling with gambling harms to seek help after they sat down with LADbible and spoke in depth about their experiences of gambling harms.
Retired England footballer Paul Merson made over 300 appearances for Arsenal between 1985 and 1997, winning multiple trophies for the London club and is now a regular pundit on Sky Sports. His professional career spanned over 20 years and during that time, in 1994 he admitted that he was suffering from gambling harms.
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Jack ‘Pieface’ McDermott is a YouTuber/Twitch streamer who made his name through streaming FIFA on the gaming platform. With 843,000 followers on Twitch he is a familiar face in the footballing YouTube world and even made an appearance on Celebrity Big Brother. Jack has been vocal in expressing his negative relationship with gambling.
Whilst they’ve both had very different careers, their stories are incredibly similar in regards to their gambling habits and Merson recalled one particular occasion, having just celebrated success on the pitch with the Gunners.
“In 1991, I had just won the league with Arsenal, I just bought a four-bedroom house, I was sitting there with concrete instead of carpet because I chose to gamble,” he said.
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Jack then responded with his own story of choosing to spend his money on gambling rather than things he needed.
“When I was in my early 20s, I moved into a shared house, the spare money I had for furnishings, I lost all of it on gambling and had a mate who helped me out,” he remarked.
The retired England footballer talked about gambling being more about the feeling rather than winning.
“Betting was literally about feeling, it didn’t matter how much I won, whatever I won or lost, the next bet was going on. I would bet until it got to zero all you do is think about gambling,” added Merson.
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“When I got my first pay packet, I had never had a bet before, I walked into the betting shop and it was like a spaceship. Just completely took me out of the way I felt, the buzz, the atmosphere. I lost every penny.”
Jack related to Paul’s first experience of betting, saying he used to play on the smaller fruit machines as a kid and like Paul’s, Jack’s first time of betting when he was 18, he went into the bookies and lost all the money he had on him.
If you feel like you are suffering from gambling harms, one thing you can do is speak to those around you and ask for help, and Jack’s grateful that his family and friends were there to support him when he needed them the most.
“If it wasn’t for them then I don’t think I’d be in the situation I’m in now,” he added. For anyone struggling, talk to your friends and family because they’ll be there to help you with it.
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Merson echoed Jack’s words, saying: “Anybody who is suffering from gambling harms, get to a Gamblers Anonymous meeting, be around people that understand them. I’m now in a good place, I’m happy and I’m there in the present, I wasn’t when I was gambling.
You can watch the full video of The Gap on the LADbible Youtube channel.
GambleAware wants to break the stigma around speaking about gambling harms and offers free advice, tools and support for anyone who is worried about their own or someone else’s gambling. Search GambleAware to find out more and let’s open up about gambling.
Thomas Thorn