A leading bookmaker has slammed federal Sports Minister Mark Arbib's suggestion that Australian sporting bodies should have the power to outlaw exotic bets.

As the scandal over an alleged NRL match sting on an exotic betting option escalated with two more arrests this week, Senator Arbib stepped up his call for a national approach to combating the match fixing.

The government has formed a working group to produce Australia-wide laws on the issue, and believes Victoria could provide the model.

Victorian legislation empowers sports to sign agreements with betting agencies which determine what can be bet on, allowing for vetoing of exotic bets.

"We are very supportive of the Victorian legislation and believe that should be looked on as a national approach," Senator Arbib told reporters in the Italian city of Varese on Thursday.

However, veteran Australian bookie Gerard Daffy said the plan would be ineffective and likely to hurt sport in Australia financially.

"Two things will happen, it will drive betting underground as people are interested in this type of thing, so they will find somewhere to do it," Daffy said.

"The other thing, and this is more important, is that it will drive punters overseas.

"The Mark Arbibs of this world aren't aware that there is less than 30 bookmakers in this country who take bets of rugby league and AFL and offer the exotic bets.

"There are almost 50 companies outside of Australia who do exactly the same thing and they don't pay or contribute anything and have no agreements in place with the NRL or any government regulator in this country."

Australian bookmakers pay five per cent of their profits from gambling on the NRL and AFL as a product fee, something overseas companies are exempt from.

Meanwhile, the Rugby League Accredited Player Agent Scheme (RLAPAS) has issued a new clause in their code of conduct banning player managers from betting on NRL matches.

It comes as leading player manager Sam Ayoub faces a charge of attempting to obtain financial advantage by deception, over an alleged scam in a North Queensland v Bulldogs NRL match in round 24 last year.

Suspicions were raised by the number of bets laid on the exotic option of a penalty to be the first scoring point of the game.

Daffy said bets on first points from a penalty were not unusual, but it was a small market.

"People will have a bet on a penalty because maybe the weather is bad or the referee is known to be one who gives a lot of penalties," he said.

Detectives from the NSW Crime Command's Casino and Racing Investigation Unit said on Friday they were still searching for four unidentified men who placed bets at TABs in the Sydney suburbs of Beaconsfield, Ashfield and the Queensland city of Townsville.

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