The Premier League has announced that the withdrawal of shirt gambling sponsorship will commence at the end of the 2025-26 season. This decision was finalized during the club’s meeting on April 13th. Concurrently, discussions were held with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport as part of the government’s ongoing review of gambling legislation. Furthermore, the Premier League intends to collaborate with other sports in creating a new code for responsible gambling sponsorship in the professional sports sector.
With this development, Premier League clubs have voluntarily agreed to remove gambling sponsorship from the front of their matchday shirts, making them the first sports league in the UK to undertake such a measure for reducing gambling advertising. Currently, eight clubs have shirt sponsorship agreements with gambling operators including Aston Villa, Everton, and Brentford. Additional partnerships with operators exist, albeit without shirt branding or logo placement.
Advocacy groups have been calling for an end to gambling-related shirt sponsorships for several years. In July of last year, The Big Step—a campaign dedicated to halting such deals—wrote an open letter urging clubs to abandon these partnerships. An InnovateChange op-ed piece published shortly thereafter suggested that operators should proactively make concessions in gambling shirt sponsorship deals rather than being compelled to do so.
