But we are doing plenty of spending, don’t get me wrong: $128.6 million just in the Lithgow LGA, and that is within one year, 2015-2016.

More than $352,328 is being gambled on poker machines every day in Lithgow. 

The turnover figure includes amounts won on the pokies and then re-invested into the machines.

Lithgow LGA also sat fourth in the amount spent per person per day on poker machines. At $16.46, Lithgow fell behind Dubbo (against the highest at $22), Orange ($19.17) and Forbes ($17.11). 

These figures show that, per person, Lithgow outspends its neighbours in Bathurst on the pokies by almost $1 a day.

But is poker machine spending the biggest gambling issue facing Lithgow residents and other communities within the Central West?

Lifeline Central West executive director Alex Ferguson doesn’t think so.

Mr Ferguson is concerned about the “unbridled capacity of online gambling”, which he has watched rise unchecked for the last five to seven years. 

It’s estimated that Australians lost $23 billion last year in gambling. The last few years have seen a huge surge in the popularity of online gambling. 

“Revenue from poker machines is not growing by much,” he said. 

“The growth industry is online and sports betting.”

Mr Ferguson believed that the amount of money gambled in the lead-up to the third State of Origin match on July 12 would have been “phenomenal”. 

“Poker machines only exist in that location, but online, you can get it on a tablet, an iPhone… you can do it at home, walking down the street or sitting in your car if you want to… and it is completely unregulated.”

It’s now rare to watch a match without breaks for odds-updates, like some kind of sideshow, a sport unto itself with its own fans. 

Gambling’s ongoing ties to sporting clubs is increasingly normalising the link between sport and gambling, which will likely be costly for us as a community.