The players participated in meetings that addressed the risks of athletes' involvement with sports betting.
Brazil.- The Club Athletico Paranaense (CAP), in collaboration with Loterías del Estado de Paraná (Lottopar), conducted talks for the athletes of the team's youth categories. The players attended the presentations on March 6 and 7. The topic of the meetings was the fight against result manipulation and the risks of athletes participating in sports betting.
The initiative was designed by the club's Human Development team and aimed to raise awareness among young players about the importance of protecting the sport. During the talks, cases of athletes who were expelled from football for their involvement in match manipulation were presented.
Marildo Campos, director of the Youth Categories at CAP, explained: "On this topic of football integrity, it is important to make these young people aware of the negative impact of such an action, with some examples of athletes already expelled from football, and to show them how important it is to be honest and play clean."
Meanwhile, Fábio Veiga, director of Operations at Lottopar, added: "We know that Athletico Paranaense has already worked on this, has already guided them. But we reinforce it. We bring positive cases, negative cases, and reporting channels, where they can report manipulations and possible contacts with people trying to recruit them."
The meeting took place while in England the future of Lucas Paquetá, a player for West Ham, is being decided. In May 2024, he was accused of participating in improper practices related to betting. This March, the Brazilian player will face a trial expected to last about three weeks. According to information circulating in the lead-up to the judicial resolution, the English Football Association (FA) will request a lifetime ban for Paquetá. The news was published by the English channel Sky Sports and confirmed by ge.
In an official statement issued by the FA in May last year, Paquetá was accused of violating conduct rules related to sports betting in matches against Leicester City, on November 12, 2022; Aston Villa, on March 12, 2023; Leeds United, on May 21, 2023, all from the last season; and Bournemouth, on August 12, 2023, in the first match of the current season. The player received a yellow card in all those matches.
