The English Premier League sprung back into the limelight at the weekend, with gambling sponsorship very much front and centre stage.

The clubs themselves voted for a voluntary ban on betting and gaming firms’ front-of-shirt sponsorship, but that ban will not come into effect until 2026.

The spirit of that decision is hardly coming through in the short term, though, with no fewer than eleven of the teams featuring a betting sponsor as their primary commercial partner.

Nottingham Forest did not have a commercial sponsor in their first season back in the top flight last year, opting instead to donate the front of their shirt to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees.

This season, though, they have replaced that for monetary value with Kaiyun Sports, a Chinese-facing gambling website with an Isle of Man registration and presumably a substantial marketing budget.

Aston Villa, Bournemouth, Brentford, Crystal Palace, Everton, Fulham, Leicester City, Southampton, West Ham and Wolves make up the rest of the 55 per cent of the League that have a betting sponsor across the front of their shirts.

Betano, BJ88, Hollywood bets, Net 88, Stake, SBO Top, BC Game, Rollbit, Betway and DE Bet.

The partnerships extend to pitch-side advertising and technology that translates the ads you might see on the ground into different languages if you are watching in overseas territories.

The sophistication of the machine for attracting football betting is as good as in any other sector and far better than most. Everything takes place digitally, and nothing takes place anonymously due to the linking of every account to a payment method.

All of the betting companies listed above are registered to operate from the United Kingdom and are, therefore, obliged to act in accordance with the principles and regulations of the UK Gambling Commission. However, few offer a marketing presence aimed at UK or Irish bettors.

The size of the betting markets across the Far East dwarfs what is coming from Europe, and that is the target for the next three years.

One regulation is that no gambling sponsor can appear on the replica kits sold to U18 fans, though the impact of this is perhaps more in the ticking of a box rather than the actual lessening of the message.

We do not object to betting on football or any other sport. It is a fully legal activity that most participants enjoy without harm.

Our Football Partner is Sky, which operates a fully legal and responsible betting operation that sponsors the SkyBet English Championship.

It has to be said, though, that betting on football matches is against the Premier League’s regulations for its own players, managers, coaches, and team officials.

There is a gap in the logic, therefore, of having such a high presence of gambling promotion in such an obvious position as the front of the shirt of more than half of the teams participating in the games’ most high-profile global league.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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