Search for justice Football Index may be long gone but users still fighting to get money back

In March 2021, the gambling website Football Index - the self-styled "stock market" of football - encountered the last of several crashes in the "share" prices on its exchange and then collapsed into administration, with at least £100m of customers' money in "open bets" trapped inside.

- Greg Wood

Many of its users suffered losses of five- and even six-figure sums, and relationships and families also fell apart under the strain. It was, and remains, the most spectacular and expensive collapse in Britain's gambling industry.

In the days and weeks that followed, details emerged of chaos, failure and incompetence at Football Index dating back to its inception and launch in 2015. It became apparent that the site had been "minting" and selling new "shares" just days before its collapse.

It soon became clear that the Gambling Commission, which had regulated and licensed Football Index as a betting product, also had serious questions to answer, since it had been warned 14 months before Football Index went bust that the site was "an exceptionally dangerous pyramid scheme", and that "10,000s of users" had been "misled into believing they are investing rather than gambling, with little or no consideration that all of their money is at risk”.

However the story soon faded from the spotlight, and while a review of the case by Malcolm Sheehan KC, a specialist in product liability and group actions, criticised both the Gambling Commission and the Financial Conduct Authority it did nothing to address the most obvious question for FI's former customers: when, or if, they would get their money back.

Three years later, a small group of individuals who refused to let go have been working doggedly to gain some measure of justice - and closure - for the trauma suffered amid FI's collapse.