The Parliamentary Joint Select Committee on Gambling Reform has made recommendations to stop the 'normalisation' of gambling during sport and the effects it has on children.
Naturally the Saints are getting their fair share of coverage, which is to be expected with the Centrebet logo on their jumpers. I just detest seeing that logo above our crest.
Some of the pieces coming out from the Committee reported in todays The Australian...........
"The Committee heard the Centrebet logo was clearly visible on a St Kilda jersey 438 times during one game"
'A young St Kilda fan watches the AFL on television on a Saturday night early in the season, his team trying to dig itself out of a first quarter hole. His favourite player, the star Nick Riewoldt, leads and marks and then lines up for goal.
The cameras zoom in for a close-up as Reiwoldt prepares to kick, the team's sponsor Centrebet, an on line gambling company, prominately displayed across his chest on his black, white and red jersey.
"If he kicks this one I bet the odds will start to move back to the Saints," the 11 year old boy says to his father, both viewers having been apprised of the match odds during the game.
This brief personal anecdote exemplifies a growing concern of parents across the country: the "normalisation" of gambling in sport for children.
It is an issue highlighted in a federal parliamentary report tabled yesterday, the Inquiry into interactive and on line gambling and gambling advertising....................................'
Of course a photo in the paper has to be of Rooey with the Centrebet logo on his guernsey.
![Sad :(](./images/smilies/icon_sad.gif)
I had real misgivings about the Saints taking on Centrebet as a sponsor.
(The evils of Gambling/Vice/Drugs and money laundering still go hand in hand in this society, not to mention the evils of match fixing in sport.
Hopefully if the Governemnt takes up some of the recommendations of this committee; and, they eventually get through parliament, I may not have to see that logo sully the Saints guernsey anymore.