How Gambling & Casino Sponsorship Has Helped Develop UK Football Clubs

The 2017/18 season is the first time since the Premier League’s inception 25 years ago that not a single club were sponsored by a beer company. While each team still retains an official alcohol partner, the brands have taken a backward step away from shirt sponsorship – and online gambling entities have rushed in to fill the gap in the market.

This season, nine of the 20 Premier League clubs have deals with gaming companies in some shape or form and last time around, that figure was even higher with half of the league sponsored by gambling firms. Not everyone is so keen on the arrangement; the FA recently dropped all ties with Ladbrokes as their official betting partner and the Labour Party have even called for casinos to be banned from football altogether.

Despite the bad press, the situation has been mutually beneficial in a number of respects, with both parties benefiting from increased exposure and the clubs gaining access to unprecedented sums of sponsorship money. This year, the deals from the nine clubs with gambling sponsors are worth a combined total in excess of £50 million.

Greater funding for grassroots football

The poor performance of the England national team has often been traced back to a lack of funding at grassroots level, and the sector was rocked even further earlier this year when Sport England announced that it would be “purposefully spending less on traditional sport so we can spend more elsewhere”.

As a result, the FA is set to receive significantly less over the coming four years than it did in the preceding four. That is certain to have a knock-on effect on football clubs all over the length and breadth of England, and with many Premier League clubs relying on youth development to supplement their squad (one only needs to look at the rise of Tottenham Hotspur’s homegrown talent for evidence), the lack of funding could hamper their in-club development framework.

Fortunately, the influx of money from betting companies can offset this problem. It’s no coincidence that all nine of the clubs sponsored by gambling firms this season traditionally reside in the bottom half of the table. Lacking the clout to negotiate huge deals with automotive and airline companies like Emirates, Chevrolet and Yokohama, the clubs at the lower end of the table welcome the source of revenue that betting companies provide.

Inflated transfer budgets, increased profiles, bigger attendances

This extra cash is not only useful in youth development and grassroots funding, but also in helping to increase transfer budgets and allow the smaller teams to compete with their bigger counterparts. For example, West Ham signed a record £10 million deal with Betway in February 2015; that same summer, they were able to splash out £8.8 million on Italian international Angelo Ogbonna and acquire French midfield maestro Dimitri Payer for £13.5 million. Many leading brands are promoted by clubs for example Betsafe Casino has been promoted by Manchester City FC, since Oct 2015

Similarly, Stoke City recently managed to revitalise their image from that of an old-fashioned outfit fond of playing hoof-ball, to a silky, slick forward-thinking club capable of attracting some of the cream of the European crop, including Xherdan Shaqiri, Jesé and Ibrahim Afellay. This increase in budget and profile has coincided with the decision to sell the naming rights for their stadium to Bet365, giving them a greater global appeal, a bigger transfer kitty to play with and has even allowed them to increase the ground capacity. Betsafe Casino has been promoted by Manchester City FC, since Oct 2015. To learn about online casinos, you can read Casinopedia’s reviews.

Unsurprisingly, Labour’s opposition to betting deals in football has been questioned by Culture Secretary Karen Bradley, who serves as an MP for Staffordshire Moorlands, the constituency to which Stoke City FC belong.

Good for competition

Casinopedia.org covers the ongoing developments an also reminds critics that might underline the increasing capitalistic elements of the beautiful game, the undeniable truth is that money talks – both in the Premier League and elsewhere. One only needs to look at the perennial one horse races in France and Germany, along with the two-team championship that is La Liga, to see how important money is to a level playing field. By sponsoring smaller clubs and giving them a bigger portfolio (both in terms of finance, brand exposure and global appeal), gambling firms can help to keep things a mite more competitive.