MEMOIR
MIGHT BITE: THE SECRET LIFE OF A GAMBLING ADDICT   
(Bloomsbury _14.99, 256pp)
Who doesn't like the odd flutter: ten quid on the Cup Final or a fiver each way on the [url=/sport/grand_national/index.html]Grand National? That's how Patrick Foster started, too.
By the time he finished a few years later, it was much more than a few quid.
In 2018, as a young teacher turning 31, popular and with a lovely girlfriend and a warm, supportive family, Foster placed nearly _50,000 in a series of complicated bets on a horse called Might Bite, gambling that it would win the showpiece Cheltenham Gold Cup, the highlight of the National Hunt jumping season.




SHORT STORIES 
Patrick supplemented his teacher's salary of _32,000 in increasingly desperate ways as the losses mounted (file image) 

But by the end he would bet on anything: from Hungarian handball to U.S. horse-racing, to Ecuadorian Under-23 football. Once he won nearly _20,000 on basketball despite not having heard of any of the teams, let alone players.
As the losses mounted, he supplemented his teacher's salary of _32,000 in increasingly desperate ways. He had 23 bank, payday or unsecured loans. He borrowed from loan sharks and drug dealers, from the parents of his pupils, from colleagues, family and friends. Since his gambling began, he had borrowed a tick under half a million pounds.
It all started so easily during his first term as a privileged Fresher at Durham University, when he popped into the local Coral betting shop with his mates. Knowing next to nothing about gambling, he fancied a quick spin on the online roulette wheel. He put the two _1 coins in his pocket on zero, the only number that is not red or black. A few seconds later the zero came up.
It was, he says, ‘12 seconds that changed my life for ever'.
Foster is searingly honest. He piles on weight as his drinking goes up. He can't sleep and is constantly hungover. Full of guilt and insecurity, he hides away.
‘My biggest issue was self-esteem,' he writes. ‘Those around me would have considered me arrogant and full of bravado. Behind closed doors I felt utterly worthless. I'd gone from being a professional cricketer to a debt-ridden gambling addict . . .'





MIGHT BITE: THE SECRET LIFE OF A GAMBLING ADDICT by Patrick Foster, with Will Macpherson (Bloomsbury _14.99, 256pp)

He can barely get through a lesson without betting and plans his classes to guarantee a few minutes at his computer with the screen out of sight.
In 2016, when his September pay cheque arrives, he gambles it away in a single day.
But this is no lolloping misery memoir. It roars along with the pace of the train under which Foster thought of hurling himself. He's very likeable, sporty, good at his job and friendly, while riddled with this crippling secret vice.
And he doesn't shirk responsibility either. At the end of the book he offers a series of ideas on how to help victims: better education, a ban on gambling with credit cards, effective treatment, banning VIP schemes and so on.
But it's not going to be easy; the gambling industry is worth billions. If you cherished this write-up and you would like to get much more information regarding slot jackpot kindly visit our own webpage. ‘The bookie always wins' is the cliche and, like most cliches, it's true. In 2020, Britain's biggest salary, _421 million, was paid to the chief executive of Bet365.
What saved Foster on that railway platform was a text message from his brother, saying he was not alone. These days, after considerable therapy, he and Charlotte are still together, happily married, and he is on good terms with his friends and colleagues.
He now works for a consultancy dedicated to stopping problem gambling.
There are 450,000 problem gamblers in the UK. Alarmingly, there are the same number of youngsters gambling every week, with 143,000 of them suffering gambling-related harm.
Foster's compelling account comes garlanded with ringing endorsements from sporting heavyweights. ‘This book will stop you in your tracks,' says England cricketer Sam Billings.
I couldn't agree more. It should be in the hands of anyone who has eyed a bet once too often.



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