Boxing and the Bind of Gambling: Dave Allen's Tale
BoxerDave Allen admits his relatives oversee his financial matters due to a problematic gambling habit.
In the realm of heavyweight boxing, Dave Allen, a Brit who's squared off against the likes of Dillian Whyte and Luis Ortiz, has disclosed his reliance on his family's intervention to keep him away from the lure of gambling.
His boxing career, starting around 2015, was marred by a severe gambling addiction, as he confessed in an interview with former middleweight champion Darren Barker.
Allen, aged 33, recounted that at his lowest, he gambled tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of pounds. His gambling addiction grew so profound that at the age of 26, he entrusted his sister with managing his finances.
Offbeat Solutions
Though Allen is an orthodox boxer, his tactics to curb his gambling were far from conventional. "If I ever need any cash, I have to text my sister and now my partner. They send me a card," explained Allen, attributing his financial control to his continued abstinence from gambling.
Allen admitted that, if given the chance, he might still give in to his gambling urges. "If I could still gamble now, I think I would," he conceded.
Allen divulged how gambling fueled his need for financial success in the ring. "I think I owed a few quid at the time of the Dillian Whyte fight, I lost around eight grand on the day of the fight, I didn't make much more than that," he admitted.
A Childhood Bet and a Lifetime of Losses
Allen's gambling habit traced back to his childhood, when he placed a £1 bet on horses at the age of eight. His penchant for gambling escalated over time, transitioning from betting shops to online gambling.
In the Barker podcast, Allen revealed that the "online stuff is where it got bad for me because it was so easy, it was just numbers on the screen."
Money Madness? Not So Much
Contrary to popular belief, Allen claimed that money wasn't his driving force behind gambling. "It's not about the money for me. I just wanted to keep winning," he asserted.
Allen returned to the ring after retiring in 2020 following a vicious knockout by David Price. His struggle with gambling addiction serves as a stark reminder of the challenges professional athletes face and the importance of support systems in overcoming them.
- "Dave Allen's financial management, now primarily overseen by his sister and partner, is a significant part of his personal-debt-management strategy, aiming to prevent a recurrence of his gambling addiction."
- "Allen's gambling addiction, exacerbated by online platforms that facilitated easy betting, led to a substantial debt that he faced even during his professional boxing career, such as the Dillian Whyte fight where he lost around eight thousand pounds."
