TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND POUNDS. In my playing days it was a transfer fee or a good annual salary. Now it’s the price of an afternoon’s entertainment. That’s the size of the bet a top Barclays Premiership footballer placed on Bolton Wanderers to beat West Ham United in the league two weeks ago. Bolton did win, and the player won £220,000, but the amount sent a shiver down my spine. It is so dangerous.

Players don’t believe that even if you’re rich you can lose the shirt off your back but I’ve seen it happen. While you’re earning a fortune you’re blasé about money and you’re arrogant enough to think you can beat the bookies. In the short term, maybe; in the long run, you will always lose. Once, in the dressing-room I talked to a player about a £100 bet I’d placed. “£100? I’ve dropped more running for a bus,” he said. There are guys doing jobs they don’t like to earn exactly that sort of sum to feed their families.

I have no problem with gambling — I’m a very serious gambler myself and people have a right to do what they like with their earnings. The fact is that top players are rich men and it’s understandable that they should splash out sums that are eye-popping to the average person. But no matter who you are, when you’re risking two or three times your weekly wage in a single bet, that is crazy.

The anonymity of online gambling has added to the appeal for players. I reckon that about 50 per cent of them like a flutter on other matches. Just after midday on Saturday is peak time. Here’s how it works. You have a team meal, the manager tells you the side, you get on the phone to your mates at other clubs and feed them the news. Armed with that knowledge, they get on the phone to the bookies.

This isn’t corrupt. Players are not betting on their own matches. In fact, large salaries are a safeguard against cheating. Players aren’t tempted to throw games because they do not need the money. Chelsea are notorious gamblers. Eidur Gudjohnsen frittered away a fortune in casinos a couple of years ago and a group of the players were reported to have lost £500,000 in one day at the Cheltenham Festival this year. Why should the manager be concerned as long as the team wins?

I read that Stan Bowles, the Queens Park Rangers legend, lost £250,000 on the horses in his career. In ten or 20 years’ time I fear we’ll be reading about a star who had it all and blew it all. And it won’t be £250,000, it’ll be £20 million. And all that living for the moment won't seem so clever.

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