How the Premier League Became Addicted to Gambling 🎲
Plus 80% of football agents could lose their licenses and why does Cristiano Ronaldo paint his toenails black?
Welcome to Athletic Interest.
If you watch a Premier League game you will see or hear a reference to gambling about once every 20 seconds.
Currently, 17 of the 20 Premier League teams have some form of a sponsorship deal with a gambling company.
Everything from social media posts and training shirts to the actual stadiums has become prime advertising space for betting companies. Perhaps the most visual element of this betting takeover is shirt sponsorship.
No industry sponsors more Premier League shirts than betting, handing over an estimated £60m (€68m) per season to some of the most recognisable names in English football.
But all of that is about to end, well, sort of…
The Premier League just agreed to a ban on betting companies sponsoring football shirts from the 2026/27 season onwards.
This is welcome news to some campaign groups that argue betting’s increased presence in football has fueled a rise in gambling addiction within the U.K.
The Premier League will be happy to be seen cleaning up its image but don’t expect betting to disappear from your screens anytime soon.
This ban only applies to shirt sponsorship within the Premier League. Betting companies will still be all over the lower leagues and have nothing stopping them from sponsoring Premier League stadiums, training kits, or social media posts.
This soft step from the Premier League has drawn criticism, but it’s not hard to understand why betting and English football have fallen so deeply in love, they are quite simply the perfect match.
A Symbiotic Relationship
Betting companies have sponsored English football since 1902 when Stoke City partnered with an early betting exchange, but the relationship didn’t really take off until about 100 years later when the establishing online betting industry met the global juggernaut that is the Premier League.
Within a few years, the relationship between the league and betting became symbiotic, with both sides helping the other establish themselves.
Premier League clubs received cold hard cash that helped develop new stadiums and fund transfers, while the betting companies were given access to their most dependable customer.
The Premier League’s biggest audience is young men. According to studies, younger men are the most likely of any group to start gambling and also the most likely to develop an addiction.
The online betting industry in the U.K. is now worth more than £2 billion per year, with almost half of that coming from bets placed on football.
Getting Creative
An estimated 20% of football fans now use betting as a way of feeling more connected to the game.
It is therefore no wonder that betting companies are constantly finding new ways to involve themselves in the Premier League.
This includes an incredibly subtle but effective agreement reached between betting company William Hill and Tottenham Hotspur that sees the club offer free wifi to all fans at their new stadium but the wifi does not allow access to the websites or apps of any of William Hill’s competitors.
Betting companies have also started offering VIP packages for certain high-profile, and big spending, individuals. Ladbrokes once paid for return business class flights from Dubai to London so that one client could watch the North London derby. The client ended up betting £1 million he had stolen from associates.
From the Premier League to Underground Betting in China 🇨🇳
It’s not just the U.K. market that betting companies can access through the Premier League. The league is widely broadcast in China, a country that bans gambling and any associated sponsorship but is home to millions of people that love to gamble illegally online or by visiting overseas casinos.
This is exactly why you may have seen Chinese lettering on the front of Premier League shirts. These betting companies use the shirt as a covert way of advertising to China’s booming underground betting industry.
Gambling has a deep hold on the Premier League. This explains why the ban was given a three-year grace period and only covers shirt sponsorship.
But at the end of the day, this was to be completely expected. For clubs outside the top six, finding a shirt sponsor that is willing to pay £10m per year is no easy task. Betting companies know they can make money from football and believe they can sell their services to pretty much any fan, no matter the club. These companies actually see a tangible economic benefit from sponsoring a side that is sitting mid-table or fighting relegation. An emerging vegan hamburger company probably couldn’t say the same.
Clubs like Everton and Newcastle now have three seasons to replace their shirt sponsors. While that may prove difficult, you can bet money that the gambling industry will find new and creative ways to get noticed.
🍎 Sports Business Bites
🤝 80% of football agents could lose their licenses.
Thousands of football agents have just sat a new FIFA test that will decide whether they are allowed to continue as licensed agents. The test, which involves 20 multiple-choice questions about FIFA regulations, has a minimum score of 75% and is only expected to be passed by about 20% of the people that take it.
This could create a major shake-up in football. For years, FIFA was busily de-regulating the work of agents. Since 2015, pretty much anyone could apply to be an agent in most major countries for a simple upfront fee of a few hundred euros. This resulted in thousands of new agents, including several family members, joining the industry. Critics became concerned that players were bringing large entourages into negotiations, often filled with family members that would become emotional at inconvenient times. The new test will try to bring a semblance of order to a rather chaotic industry.
Anyone that fails the test, or the re-sit in October, will not be allowed into a negotiation unless they are accompanied by a licensed agent. For those wondering about how difficult the test is, feel free to try answering these mock questions:
👟 The Boot Room
📝 Most people that have worked in an office for many years probably feel that memos are a waste of time. Just another piece of corporate jargon to clutter the desk.
Well, there is one notable exception to this unwritten rule…
This is a memo from Nike executive Rob Strasser, written in 1977, explaining the core principles of the company.
This list, which is gaining attention online after featuring in the recent Nike/Michael Jordan biopic Air, provides a fascinating insight into the early days of the company and remains arguably one of the most important documents in Nike’s history.
At the time Strasser sat down to write this list Nike was far from the global juggernaut we know today. The company has already been dropped by two banks and sales sat at just $28.7 million, that’s 0.06% of Nike’s 2022 turnover.
To make matters worse, The U.S. federal government had just said the company owed it $25 million for unpaid tariffs on imported sneakers. According to co-founder Phil Knight, payment of those tariffs would have put the company "out of business."
Considering everything Nike was up against, Strasser was concerned that the employees were losing sight of the company’s core values and decided to distribute his 10 principles around the office.
Nike historian emeritus Scott Reames describes the list as "raw," and reflective of the company's scrappy early days when it had to stretch budgets – "Live off the land" – and tangle with much larger competitors, most notably Adidas – "This is as much about battle as about business."
The list clearly struck a chord with Nike employees, with several explaining to Reames that they still have their original copies all these years later.
"For people to save a document that wasn't an official Nike decree, or put on a poster – for them to save it for 40-some odd years, that speaks for itself," Reames told Insider.
Within three years of the list’s publication, Nike’s revenues had increased to $270 million. The company also managed to settle the customs dispute for $9 million, a move that allowed it to go public and transform into the global brand of today.
While Nike’s values have changed over the years, the legacy of Strasser still lives on. One of Strasser’s original 10 principles, “Be on the offense, always,” remains a favorite among Nike executives.
📈 While Strasser does warn that ‘it won’t be pretty,’ it’s likely that even he would have found this graph to be very attractive.
Well, maybe, he did go on to work for Adidas after leaving Nike so…
Anyway, this graph shows how Nike absolutely dominated the worldwide sneaker market in 2022, with sales more than double that of its closest rival Adidas.
Much of this domination by Nike can actually be linked back to those days under Strasser in the 70s and early 80s. This is when Nike created some of its most iconic designs that are, in some cases, still more popular than many modern shoes with the latest technology.
🦈 Talking of the latest technology, Adidas has just unveiled new plastic-free jerseys that will be used in the MLS on Earth Day (Saturday.)
Inter Miami is one of the clubs that will display this new technology and decided on a rather unique photoshoot to drive up the hype.
📱 Social Media Madness
🎤 For this week’s social media offering we have a very strange mix…
A few days ago, an unknown Premier League footballer released a music video under the rap name ‘Dide.’ Fans have been furiously speculating as to the identity of the masked footballer, with many convinced that the lyrics suggest he plays for Arsenal.
Others have said that the rapper must be Arsenal striker Eddie Nketiah, with the pseudonym ‘Dide’ being an anagram for Eddi - a variation of the name Eddie.
When Ronaldo released this image on his Instagram a few days ago, fans were confused as to why he had painted his toenails black.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear that Ronaldo is living a secret life as a goth. The real reason is slightly different.
According to Bild, many athletes paint their nails to provide a protective surface that prevents the build-up of fungus or bacteria, a common problem when you wear sweaty shoes for several hours a day.
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Loved this extra-large edition 👏👏