Alan Mulholland: ‘We have never come across lack of integrity in any GAA match’

Prominent bookmaker and former Galway football manager Alan Mulholland says teams betting on themselves to win or advance in a competition is “a healthy form of motivation”.

Mulholland backs the GAA’s new rule which prohibits a player, management team member or match official from gambling on a game in which they are involved. Even though he believes policing it is “nearly impossible”, he can appreciate why the rule has been introduced, recognising the integrity of competition must be upheld.

Although teams will no longer be able to back themselves to win games, the Salthill-Knocknacarra man sees nothing wrong in them backing themselves to do well in competitions. “We have accepted collective bets from teams to win championships. I didn’t see anything wrong with panels coming together, pooling their money and using it that way as a healthy form of motivation.

“We have had managers and captains come to us in the past saying: ‘I’m getting 20 quid a head from the lads — we’re quoted at 10/1 to win the championship. Will you give us 12s?’ They have done it as a motivational tool. That might be against that new directive because they are involved but backing themselves like that is more incentive to train and win.

“You’re not talking about life-changing amounts; you’re talking about enough to cover the party at the end of the championship or maybe a deposit on a holiday or a weekend away. That could be against the new rule but I don’t think teams collectively backing themselves is necessarily a bad thing. What is a bad thing is if they backed somebody else in a competition they’re involved in.”

Mulholland recalls the famous story of how Kilnadeema-Leitrim hurlers took the bookmakers for almost €43,000 in 2003. Players and management each put between €50 and €100 into a kitty and backed themselves to qualify from the group stages of the Galway SHC at odds of 33/1.

“They were derogatory odds. They had never won a senior championship match in their history but they fancied themselves to get out of their group and get to the quarter-finals. You can work it out that it didn’t take a whole lot of money to win that amount. We had a photo of them collecting the money in our Loughrea shop, the shop closest to the club.”

Mulholland has praised the integrity of GAA clubs when it comes to betting. “Since my grandfather set up the business in 1938, we have never come across a lack of integrity in any GAA match. We would have markets on a lot of club GAA going to junior and intermediate and haven’t experienced anything untoward.

“People love to believe a rumour or a scandal and there’s been a number of stories that have become folklore. When upsets have happened in matches, you’ll hear: ‘Your man had something backed’ but I have never known any of those to be true. Managers have contacted me to see if I saw anything suspicious and in my experience it’s never been true.”

Mulholland believes the new GAA gambling rule is a “no-brainer”.

“The markets have moved on so much in the last five to 10 years and it’s very hard for any sporting organisation to keep up with it all. There are so many markets in a match and some of them that have nothing to do with the final result; who’s leading at half-time, the total number of scores and the first goalscorer.

“Someone might think they can bet on that but where do you draw the line and the line has become so blurred over the last while. Some guys might innocently think it’s not going to affect their performance. They might back their team-mate to be the first goalscorer or themselves thinking that it won’t have any influence on how they play but it can and it does.”

Policing the new rule, though, will be a problem, says Mulholland, who believes awareness and education are the best means of tackling problem gambling. “Not all of our staff would know everybody who comes in. Are they supposed to know this fella coming in is supposed to be togging out for his club on Sunday and can’t bet on these markets?

“It’s no harm that the GAA have said that this is wrong. I wouldn’t criticise them for that but the policing is a whole other issue.”