Premier League 2024/25 Sponsors Examined – Why do Asian non-UKGC Brands Love EPL Shirts?

The 2024/25 Premier League season is in full swing, so while we wait for some weekend action we’ve decided to bring you a detailed overview of the kit deals, shirt sponsors and sleeve sponsors for each of the 20 clubs.

In this breakdown we’ll take a special look at gambling companies as they’re a controversial subject, so we have invited Edward Howarth of DashTickets to shed some light on what’s going on. Gambling companies will no longer be allowed as shirt sponsors from 2026/27, which gives them two more seasons of being displayed on shirts in this league.

Edward will explain why these brands appear on teams’ shirts and why some would want to appear if they don’t have a valid United Kingdom Gambling Commission licence. If you’re only interested in reading that, scroll down. But before we proceed, let’s first put things into perspective and provide sponsorship numbers for each team.

Premier League Teams Ranked by Sponsorship Revenue

The table below ranks the Premier League clubs by total sponsorship revenue coming from kit manufacturer deals, front-of-shirt sponsors and sleeve sponsors. The two Manchester teams are leading the list with over £150m each, while there are three clubs that are only getting £10m or less per year.

Rank	Team	Kit Manufacturer	Shirt Sponsor	Sleeve Sponsor	Combined Sponsorship Revenue
1.	Manchester United	Adidas £75m	Snapdragon £60m	DXC £20m	£155m
2.	Manchester City	Puma £72m	Etihad Airways £60m	OKX £20m	£152m
3.	Arsenal	Adidas £75m	Emirates £40m	Visit Rwanda £10m	£125m
4.	Liverpool	Nike £45m	Standard Chartered £50m	Expedia £12m	£107m
5.	Tottenham	Nike £30m	AIA £40m	Kraken £10m	£90m
6.	Chelsea	Nike £56m	N/A	Fever £8m	£64m
7.	Newcastle	Adidas £30m	Sela £25m	Noon £7.5m	£62.5m
8.	Everton	Castore £20m	Stake £18m	Christopher Ward £1.5m	£39.5m
9.	Aston Villa	Adidas £17m	Betano £20m	Trade Nation £2m	£39m
10.	Leicester	Adidas £4m	BC.Game £15m	Bia Saigon £2.5m	£21.5m
11.	West Ham	Umbro £7m	Betway £12m	Intuit QuickBooks £2m	£21m
12.	Nottingham Forest	Adidas £10m	Kaiyun Sports £7m	Ideagen £1m	£18m
13.	Fulham	Adidas £2m	SBOTOP £10m	WebBeds £3.75m	£15.75m
14.	Crystal Palace	Macron £4m	NET88 £10m	Kaiyun Sports £2m	£16m
15.	Brighton	Nike £3m	American Express £10m	Experience Kissimmee £2m	£15m
16.	Ipswich	Umbro £10m	Ed Sheeran £4m	Halo £1m	£15m
17.	Wolves	Sudu	Debet £10m	JD Sports £2m	£12m + Sudu
18.	Bournemouth	Umbro £1.5m	BJ88 £7.5m	LEOS International £1m	£10m
19.	Brentford	Umbro £1.5m	Hollywoodbets £6m	PensionBee £2m	£9.5m
20.	Southampton	Puma	Rollbit £8m	P&O Cruises £1m	£9m + Puma

Kit manufacturer deals

Kit manufacturer deals are probably telling the best story regarding the size and popularity of clubs, as they’re, to a large extent, related to the size of the fanbase and the number of sold shirts. Manchester Utd, Arsenal and Manchester City are the top three clubs in this regard, with deals above £70m. Chelsea and Liverpool are in the second tier with £56m and £45m respectively. The circle of big teams is completed by Tottenham and Newcastle, with £30m deals each, with the latter more due to business connections than the popularity of the club.

Some of the smallest clubs are geting peanuts in comparison, so it’s possible to have your kit and logo run around the Premier League stadiums for as low as £1.5m per year, which is what Umbro is paying Brentford and Bournemouth. Fulham, a stable Premier League team, is only getting £2m, from Adidas, and £3m that Nike is paying Brighton is certainly proving to be a bargain on a pound-per-goal-scored in that shirt basis.

Nottingham Forest and Ipswich are getting amazing deals from kit manufacturers, £10m each, despite ranking in the bottom three by size of fan base. Forest has less than a million fans, while Ipswich has the league-lowest tally of around 300,000. For comparison, most of the top six teams have over 50 million worldwide fans if you look at social media.

West Ham and Aston Villa have very large fan bases that are just behind the big six. They have more than 15 million followers on social media each. Aston Villa translated that into a solid £17m deal with Adidas, but West Ham is only getting £7m from Umbro.

Southampton and Wolves have not announced the financial details of their respective deals with Puma and Sudu.

Shirt Sponsors – Which industries pay the most?

There’s no denying that the front-of-shirt sponsorship is by far the most visible and recognizable advertising space in English football, as many fans come to associate the brand with the team and its respective success in that season. There’s just something about that front-of-shirt logo that gives character to the shirt and to the team. Everyone still remembers that best Manchester Utd team in the early 90’s had Sharp on the front, and the invincible Arsenal 2003/04 team was sponsored by O2. Standard Chartered is already an iconic element of Liverpool shirts. That deal ends in 2027, by the way.

Travel £151.75m

Airlines and tourism – travel, in general – are the most rewarding shirt sponsors, with Etihad and Emirates ever-present on Manchester City and Arsenal shirts respectively, though this has a lot to do with club ownership. Same is true with Sela, the Newcastle front-of-shirt sponsor, that deals with luxury events in Saudi Arabia and it’s therefore unlikely that any Englishman will require their services. The other travel advertisers – Visit Rwanda, Expedia, WebBeds and P&O Cruises – are all relegated to sleeve appearances only. They combine for £26.75m.

Finance £134m

Financial services, including banks, accounting and crypto, are probably the most diverse group of Premier League sponsors. OKX, Standard Chartered, AIA, Trade Nation, Intuit QuickBooks, American Express and PensionBett are bringing £134m into the league. It makes a lot of sense to advertise a financial service, doesn’t it? You got money, and you pay money to have people trust you with their money.

OKX and Kraken are the two notable crypto companies, appearing on sleeves of Manchester City and Tottenham respectively, with a few more gambling operators that also accept crypto. The crypto enthusiasts will see this as a sign that crypto isn’t going away but that the bear market might, soon enough.

Gambling £125m

Gambling companies are the most plentiful sponsor and the most common sight on front of the shirt. There’s 11 gambling companies on Premier League players’ chests, with only one on the sleeve. They bring £125m into the Premier League annually, although they’re notably absent from the big six shirts. Aston Villa, Everton and West Ham are the prominent mid-table teams sponsored by betting companies. The data is prepared and collected by Slot Day, a portal that handles big data for the gambling industry.

Now let’s take you to Edward and have him explain what’s going on with the gambling sponsors.

Premier League Gambling Sponsors Breakdown

Betano is the most prominent gambling sponsor in the league, appearing on front of Aston Villa shirts for £20m per year. The link is clear – when you visit the Betano website you’ll see an Aston Villa badge and can get £30 in bonuses when you bet £10.

Stake.com is a £18m sponsor of Everton, and is one of the hottest crypto sportsbooks and casinos right now, with plenty of influencers backing it on social media. BC.game is paying £15m to appear on front of Leicester shirts. Interestingly, both sportsbooks have the same owner, TGP Europe Ltd, and have dedicated UK websites licensed by UKGC that look almost nothing like their rest-of-the-world counterparts. There’s a third one – SBOTOP of Fulham front-of-shirt fame. They pay £10m for the privilege.

Betway has been the West Ham sponsor since 2015 and the deal was extended until 2025. The betting company is paying £12m per year. Rollbit, the Southampton £8m sponsor, is another ‘true’ bookmaker that has a UKGC licence and that also sponsors Napoli in Serie A. Hollywoodbets that appears on Brentford shirts is also real; it’s originally a South African sporsbook and a cool one, too.

The Asian-facing gambling sponsors – Why are they here?

Net88, the Crystal Palace front-of-shirt sponsor, is a Vietnamese company that was barely even visible online before striking a two-year deal with Palace. Same goes for Debet, the Wolverhampton sponsor for £10m. BJ88, the £7.5m shirt sponsor of Bournemouth, doesn’t even have a functional website yet, just a notice by TGP Europe Ltd that one is coming up, yet they paid twice as much as another Asia-facing bookmaker, Dafabet, was paying until their own deal expired.

Stake, BC.game, Net88, Debet and BJ88 don’t have their own functioning UK-facing websites, but these have instead been licensed through white label arrangements with the existing licence holder, which is TGP Europe.

Kaiyun Sports is the only company that appears on multiple shirts. They are front-of-shirt sponsors of Nottinham Forest for £7m and sleeve sponsors of Crystal Palace for £2m, and they’re also one of the partners of Chelsea.

These companies, Edward claims, are not really targeting the UK players. They couldn’t possibly, since they don’t have a licence to accept them as clients. What they’re doing instead is advertising to their domestic audience in Asia – huge fans of the Premier League and of the big six – and are using shirts of lesser clubs as means to an end. SBO, for example, is marketing to high rollers in Asia.

For clubs, these sponsorships are very lucrative, better than the deals they could get from non-gambling companies. But the real purpose is not really to appear on a Wolverhampton shirt, for example, but to be on TV when there’s a Manchester Utd or a Manchester City match against Wolverhampton.

That, it seems, is well worth the investment. Now here’s the kicker – in some Asian markets gambling and gambling advertising are illegal, so these companies don’t really have a way to get to the customers. Enter Premier League shirt sponsorships.

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