Green’s Dictionary of Slang

chancer n.

1. anyone who risks their luck, usu. foolishly, although the over-riding image is of their ‘getting away with it’; thus chancing adj.

1884
190019502000
2020
[R. Lawson Upton-on-Severn Words 12: Chancer, one who makes rash and inexact statements. ‘She’s a bit of a chancer.’].
[UK]Barrère & Leland Dict. of Sl., Jargon and Cant.
[UK](con. WWI) Fraser & Gibbons Soldier and Sailor Words 51: A Chancer: a prevaricator.: a ‘half-truther.’ One taking the chance of being found out.
[Ire]S. O’Casey Plough and the Stars Act II: I’m not goin’ to let you demean yourself be talkin’ to a tittherin’ chancer.
[Ire]B. Duffy Rocky Road 148: Is he a chancer that ye’d think was tryin’ to walk on eggs and not break them.
[UK]G. Kersh They Die with Their Boots Clean 115: I can smell a chancer at five ’undred yards.
[UK]G. Kersh Fowlers End (2001) 102: Put a sock in it, you little chancer.
[UK]L. Dunne Goodbye to The Hill (1966) 87: This is Willie Egan, the biggest chancer in Rathmines.
[UK]G.F. Newman You Flash Bastard 33: Must be silly as a fucking goat [...] Even using his own name. I wonder if some team put him in there. Could be he’s just a chancer.
[UK]M. Amis London Fields 367: In Keith’s spin-off of it, the star-crossed lover looks like an old chancer whose steed has fallen ten yards from the post.
[Ire](con. 1930s) M. Verdon Shawlies, Echo Boys, the Marsh and the Lanes 19: I’ve heard them say Cork people are a bit underhand – awful chancers.
[Scot]I. Welsh Trainspotting 125: She married ma Grandad first likes, a chancin auld cowboy fae County Wexford.
[UK]Guardian 23 Jan. 6: These criminals are defined as ‘chancers’ – unarmed, unskilled opportunists who will generally only turn violent if they are provoked.
[Scot]L. McIlvanney All the Colours 3012: ‘[Y]ou’re a chancer, Gerry. Or else you’re a wanker’.
[UK]J.J. Connolly Viva La Madness 20: The dubious chancers who inhabited that scene [i.e. clubs].
[Ire]L. McInerney Blood Miracles 121: ‘A spell,’ she whispers. ‘To ward off ex-girlfriends and pretty little chancers’.
[Scot]A. Parks Bloody January 230: [H]e’d left those chancers in his wake a long time ago.
[Aus]G. Disher Consolation 184: Here was a nasty old chancer, a wheeler and dealer at the most miserable level of commerce.

2. (UK milit.) a liar.

[UK]‘Army Slang’ in Regiment 11 Apr. 31/2: A lie, or a liar, is known as a ‘chancer’.

3. a bet, a wager.

[UK]J. Cameron It Was An Accident 155: They also had a little chancer on me and the boys getting it sorted.