Stoke City midfielder Matthew Etherington has admitted that Stoke`s hierarchy helped him through his struggles with gambling debt.
The winger told BBC Radio: ‘Him (Pulis) and the chairman were fantastic.
‘I went to them seven or eight months down the line after joining in the January and told them everything that went on.
‘They didn’t lend me money. They just sorted out a contract. Instead of getting my normal wages every month, they would subsidise that so I got a lump sum to pay off some of the debts.”
Etherington, 32, who reportedly lost £1.5 million at the heights of his struggles, also admitted that he used loan sharks to finance his addiction.
His addiction began whilst at Tottenham but escalated during his spell at West Ham, where he reckons he was betting £40,000 a month on poker, horse racing and greyhounds.
Etherington, who was talking to BBC Radio on the day sports charity Sporting Chance revealed players are now using Payday loan companies to settle their bills added: “‘I don’t think the payday loans were about when I was gambling otherwise I would probably be one of (the players using payday loans) myself.
“I was frequently spending my month’s wages and then lending money off loan sharks and towards the end it got very, very bad.
‘It never got to the point where I was threatened physically or anything like that but I couldn’t always pay it back because I was gambling it away,’ he told BBC radio. There were a few heated conversations.’
‘I’m debt-free now and looking forward to the rest of my life, and making sure I have a future.’
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