third top scorer in the championship, Ivan Toney suspended for eight months for sports betting

The best season of Ivan Toney’s career turns into a nightmare. Third top scorer in the Premier League with 20 goals, behind Erling Haaland and Harry Kane, the Brentford striker was suspended for eight months and fined 50,000 pounds by the English Football Federation (FA) on Wednesday May 17, for sports betting. The striker, who dreamed of competing in the World Cup with the England selection last November, will not be able to play again until January 16, 2024.

Brentford supporters have known for several months that their striker was facing a potential suspension. Toney had announced himself on his Twitter account last November to have “assisted the FA in its investigations” on 262 breaches of the rules of the body on sports betting. The Englishman, who had his first selection with the Three Lions last March, was found guilty of having bet on multiple occasions between February 25, 2017 and January 23, 2021, i.e. after arriving in Brentford in the summer of 2020.

One of the best strikers in the Premier League

“The Brentford striker has been convicted of breaking rule E8 262 times” on sports betting, writes the FA in its press release, which specifies that the player admitted 232 infringements in total. The sanction against Toney was “imposed by an independent Regulatory Commission following a personal hearing“.”Toney is allowed to return to training only with his club for the final four months of his suspension, effective September 17, 2023“, adds the instance.

“Brentford FC take note of Independent Regulatory Commission’s decision to impose an eight-month ban on Ivan Toney from all football-related activity, effective immediately“, reacted Brentford in a press release published in the process. Top scorer in the English third division with Peterborough in 2020, then in the second division with Brentford the following season, Toney lived his first full season in the Premier League last year with the Bees.

He has established himself this season as one of the best strikers in the Premier League, alongside stars such as Haaland, Kane, Mohamed Salah and Marcus Rashford. His emergence into the elite of English football at an advanced age for a professional player had enchanted the Premier League in recent months. Ninth in the English championship, Brentford will have to do without their player for the last two days of the current season and for the first six months of the next.