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NEARLY ALL OF Nicolo Fagioli's texts have become public. Most alarming are the ones he received from a criminal money lender that promised to end his career if he didn't pay up.

"I'll make you quit. I'll put you to work as a bricklayer. I'll even take away the pen you use to sign your contracts," read a message obtained by Italian newspaper La Corriere della Sera.

Fagioli's betting history is nothing new. He already served a seven-month ban for placing bets on football matches and using illegal websites to wager on them. But prosecutors named him again last week after busting a jewelry store in Milan and seizing €1.5 million in illegal payments. The store allegedly processed debt payments as luxury watch purchases, but watches never actually changed hands.

All the while, Fagioli drowned in debt. He owed €1.5 million and was facing interest charges of €140,000, according to La Gazzetta dello Sport. He was so deep into the network that he became an unwitting recruiter. He sought the help of friends and family to cover losses that exceeded his salary. He was 19 when it started and in survival mode.

Sandro Tonali fell into a similar hole, and the names of past and current Juventus players Angel Di Maria, Weston McKennie, and Mattia Perin have also emerged. These players are just pawns in a greater illegal network that preys on people with gambling addictions.

Tonali and Fagioli, in particular, have already paid the price privately and publicly. They've both sought therapy and seem to have come through the toughest period of their lives as better people and players. Tonali is scoring again for Newcastle and recently won the League Cup. Fagioli has a new lease on life at Fiorentina.

Yet they're the ones who seem to suffer the most, not the criminal betting organizers who have no recognizable faces. Tonali and Fagioli headline the investigation even if they're no longer really the protagonists in it. They're forced to relive the nightmare that nearly cost them everything.

"These boys are like children to me and they cannot be lambs to the slaughter as they are becoming. It is not a civil way in a civil country," FIGC president Gabriele Gravina said when Tonali and Fagioli were initially suspended in October 2023. "In Italy there exists a disease. Gambling addiction is a social plague, not just one of Italian football. There are 5.1 million people who play and 1.5 million are suffering. It is unsurprising that some of them are also involved in football."

It's not just unsurprising. It's entirely expected. How could betting not embed itself deeply in the ecosystem when halftime ads on Italian television feature the latest odds and the very newspapers that report on betting crimes push lines to readers? How could players not get sucked into the underworld when clubs accept sponsorships from betting companies and push speculative fan tokens on crypto exchanges? Serie A used to ban these companies from sponsoring teams. At a time when players are battling severe addictions and falling prey to bad actors, the league and its teams are all too happy to ride the financial windfall that's come from them.

The good thing is that investigators continue to uncover these illegal networks. But players like Tonali and Fagioli are victims, too. It's hard to get rid of the problem when the league sees the most problematic players as a solution.