Premier League bans betting sponsors on the front of shirts

With the ban approaching, clubs and bookmakers are rushing to sign front-of-shirt deals while it is still possible. West Ham have struck a partnership with BOYLE Sports, and Nottingham Forest have signed with Bally’s. The logic is easy to see: lock in a foothold now so that, once the ban takes effect, they have an advantage in negotiations over sponsorship in other formats.

Parimatch on Leeds’ sleeve and a new placement standard

The “move” is already playing out in practice. Leeds United, on returning to the Premier League, dropped local partners such as the Flamingo Land theme park and the home-heating brand Boxt, signing a deal with Parimatch as sleeve sponsor. This case could set the tone across the league: the sleeve slot becomes the new showcase that the shirt front used to be.

Training kit appears more often than match kit

A second visibility channel is even more intriguing. BetMGM has been Tottenham’s training kit sponsor since July 2024. Given the volume of content clubs produce every day around training, behind-the-scenes shoots and media interviews, the BetMGM logo appears on camera almost more often than the main shirt sponsor’s branding—Hong Kong-based insurer AIA.

Social media is what turns training kit into a powerful advertising vehicle. Short videos, training-ground reports and pre-match interviews are posted daily and rack up millions of views. Younger audiences, including under-18s who are legally prohibited from gambling in the UK, consume this content most actively. Shifting betting advertising into “digital” risks not reducing—and could even increase—teenagers’ exposure to betting brands.

Belgium and Italy have already shown how bans are circumvented

Other countries’ experience confirms how adaptive the industry is. In Belgium and Italy, after similar restrictions were introduced, bookmakers began promoting their “infotainment” arms and related brands, formally remaining within the realm of football advertising. The partial ban proved for them not a wall but a gate.

The football pyramid without uniform rules

Below the Premier League, the picture looks even more paradoxical. The English Football League (EFL), which comprises the second, third and fourth tiers, is sponsored by Sky Bet, and matches are broadcast on Sky Sports—the very same channel that also shows Premier League games. EFL clubs are allowed betting main sponsors without restrictions, and a logical consequence of the ban at the top will be a flow of marketing budgets down the pyramid.

At the same time, football betting in the country is becoming increasingly popular amid the overall growth of the iGaming industry. Football fans firmly hold the top spot in betting activity. Online casinos can rival football betting in popularity, especially if they offer customers apps with popular live casino games. We corroborated this using apps on this site, which show app-download statistics for the game Funky Time.  The site’s data indicates growth in the number of interested users.

However, in betting the most popular segment remains football betting. Basketball betting competes with it in popularity, but high-profile scandals have called the integrity of this sport into question.

European competitions highlight the contradictions

The scale of the problem becomes even clearer in the context of international tournaments. According to The Guardian, two thirds of clubs across 31 European divisions have at least one betting partner. This means that visiting teams coming to English stadiums in European competitions can still take the pitch with bookmakers on the front of their shirts. At one point, Everton were forced to tape over the logo of beer sponsor Chang in certain European matches due to local restrictions on alcohol advertising. No one will demand similar concessions on betting from foreign teams. Moreover, UEFA itself is deepening its ties with the industry: bet365 and Betano have become official partners of the Champions League and the Europa League respectively.

Licensing instead of window dressing

Among the proposals being discussed in expert circles, several concrete steps stand out:

• allow only brands with a genuine UK presence and a UK licence to take on major sponsorships;
• raise requirements for responsible marketing and audience protection after a deal is signed;
• police circumvention schemes, including promotion via subsidiary “media” brands;
• require sponsors to reinvest part of the funds into local social-impact and prevention programmes.

The case of TGP Europe is telling: it left the UK market amid regulatory scrutiny over anti-money-laundering compliance. At the same time, the brands SBOTOP, bj88 and DEBET remained on the front of Premier League shirts. Under the current rules, it is enough for clubs to ensure the operator is not accessible to UK customers. Requiring a full UK licence for such placements could become the first real filter.

When sponsorship works differently

Examples of “responsible” cooperation already exist. Through partnerships with Middlesbrough and Rangers, Kindred promoted its zero per cent goal, aiming for zero revenue from harmful gambling. Sky Bet, together with the EFL, developed initiatives for fans: surveys, loyalty programmes, and mental health campaigns. Both examples show that sponsorship can be tied to measurable commitments and public-interest initiatives, rather than being reduced to logo placement.

A narrowly targeted ban changes the label, but does not reduce betting’s influence on football. Without uniform, agreed and verifiable requirements developed jointly by leagues, clubs, UEFA and the state, regulation remains “patchwork”. The alternative is not to shift ads from one part of the kit to another, but to tighten entry criteria, licensing, and sponsor obligations—including their contributions to public programmes.