Former Mexico youth international and Macarthur FC captain Ulises Davila, who was named the A-League Men player of the year in 2021, has admitted his role in a lucrative card-fixing scam.
Davila, 34, was accused of being the ringleader of the betting scam which saw him and two Macarthur teammates deliberately earn yellow cards to satisfy a betting outcome.
The charges related to six football games across the 2023-24 A-League Men season.
The former Chelsea junior faced a Sydney court on Thursday and pleaded guilty to facilitating and engaging in conduct that corrupts the betting outcome of an event. Eight charges against him including that he directed and participated in a criminal group were withdrawn by prosecutors in the Downing Centre Local Court.
Davila will be sentenced on Dec. 19.
During a match on Dec. 9, 2023, against Sydney FC, Davila and his teammates Clayton Lewis and Kearyn Baccus were handed yellow cards. The captain was cautioned for delaying play by kicking the ball away, Lewis was carded for pushing an opponent in the chest, and Baccus was rebuked for a poor tackle. Bets had been placed on the Macarthur team receiving at least four cards during the game, according to facts agreed to by Davila's teammates.
Winning payouts for the bets placed through gambling site Betplay totalled more than $200,000. Davila paid Lewis and Baccus $10,000 each for their roles in the betting scam, the teammates said. Both men were handed good-behaviour bonds and escaped conviction in September, with the magistrate finding the pair were "right at the bottom of the scheme."
Lewis and Baccus emphasised they had become involved at the behest of Davila, who they claimed was "not only the captain of the team, but the captain of the scheme." All three players were suspended by Macarthur FC after their arrests and are no longer contracted to the team. The club previously issued a strongly worded statement that said "serious deficiencies" around integrity processes in Australian football needed to be addressed.
"The systems in place are inadequate to protect clubs from risk and lack the responsiveness required to manage issues of this magnitude," the statement read.
"A comprehensive review and reform of integrity protocols is urgently required to safeguard the future of the game."
Davila was an elite youth talent who played at an Under-20 World Cup with Mexico and was signed by English powerhouse Chelsea as a 20-year-old.
He never cracked the Blues first team, and instead played in a number of leagues before arriving in the A-League Men in 2019 with Wellington Phoenix. He won the Johnny Warren Medal as the best player in the league in 2020-21 and shifted to Macarthur after that season, where he was named captain.
In 2022, the Mexican faced heartbreak as Lily Pacheco, his wife and mother of their two-year-old son, died suddenly aged 31.
Australian National Gambling Helpline: 1800 858 858