An ex-Arsenal academy footballer has been jailed for four years for his involvement in a £600,000 drug smuggling plot after a court heard his financial difficulties after a period out of contract led to a “catastrophic error of judgment”.

Jay Emmanuel-Thomas was arrested after officers from the National Crime Agency seized an estimated £600,000 of cannabis as it was being brought through Stansted Airport by two women he had recruited – his girlfriend and her friend.

An earlier hearing at Chelmsford Crown Court in Essex was told the women believed they were importing gold.

But Border Force officers detected roughly 60kg (132lb) of the drug in two suitcases, which had arrived in the UK from Bangkok, Thailand, via Dubai.

The 34-year-old striker, of Cardwell Road in Gourock, Inverclyde, was arrested in the town in September 2024.

He pleaded guilty at an earlier hearing to fraudulent evasion of the prohibition on the importation of cannabis between July 1 2024 and September 2 2024.

Emmanuel-Thomas was sacked by Scottish Championship side Greenock Morton after his arrest last year.

Prosecutor David Josse KC told Chelmsford Crown Court the “interception” of the two women – Emmanuel-Thomas’s girlfriend Yasmin Piotrowska and her friend Rosie Rowland – happened at the airport.

He said it “became apparent this defendant, Jay Emmanuel-Thomas, had been involved in their recruitment to travel to Thailand”.

He noted Emmanuel-Thomas “had played a few games, 11 in total, for a club in Thailand”.

The barrister said Emmanuel-Thomas had “some awareness and understanding of the scale of the operation” and was acting in an “operational management function” in the plot.

He pointed out the defendant’s “relationship with Ms Piotrowska” when describing the recruitment of the two women.

The footballer, whose former clubs include Ipswich, Bristol City, QPR, Livingston, Aberdeen and Thai side PTT Rayong, was sentenced on Thursday.

The bearded defendant wore a grey suit jacket and black shirt, with his long hair swept back as he listened to proceedings from the secure dock.

Ms Piotrowska sat in the public gallery and wept for much of the hearing.

Alex Rose, for Emmanuel-Thomas, said: “The financial gain in this case for Mr Emmanuel-Thomas was £5,000.”

Mr Rose said the defendant was a father of two and had made a “catastrophic error of judgment”.

He said a “period of being out of contract led to very significant financial hard times” and he “succumbed to temptation”.

“Although he had previously experienced periods of being in between contracts or – putting it another way – being unemployed as a footballer, they had largely been on the back of fairly lucrative long-term contracts,” said Mr Rose.

He said the “situation was rather different in the background to this”.

“Having been out of contract prior to signing for Greenock Morton, he had a brief contract with Kidderminster Harriers but that was very much a short-term contract, almost to try to assist someone he had a good relationship with,” he said.

Mr Rose continued: “His football career is finished and that’s something he has brought entirely on himself.

“It’s a devastating blow for somebody who had such promise and such an impressive football career.”

Judge Alexander Mills, jailing Emmanuel-Thomas for four years, said: “It’s through your own action that you will no longer be known for playing professional football.

“You will be known as a criminal. A professional footballer who threw it all away.”

The judge said Emmanuel-Thomas had played five games for Greenock Morton and was on a £600 per week contract at the time of the incident.

He said the defendant “recruited” his girlfriend and her friend and was “essentially turning the importation of cannabis into an all-expenses paid holiday in the Far East”, arranging business class flights, hotel costs and discussing in messages how to maximise their time on the Thai island of Ko Samui.

Emmanuel-Thomas looked straight ahead as the judge read out his sentence.

He nodded towards the public gallery as he was led to the cells.

Ms Piotrowska, 33, of Purves Road, Kensal Rise, north-west London, and Ms Rowland, 29, of Southend Road, Chelmsford, Essex, denied the charge and at an earlier hearing prosecutors offered no evidence in their case.

Mr Josse said at an earlier hearing that the women “said they thought they were importing gold not cannabis”, and the judge directed that not guilty verdicts be recorded for them.