A study published this week has revealed the shocking extent to which viewers of Premier League matches are exposed to gambling ads, with around 16 appearing per minute on average.
Sampling ten broadcasts across the 2022/23 season covering all clubs in the league, the findings were deeply concerning: with researchers documenting 15,663 on-screen gambling-associated logos, with one game exceeding 3,500 instances alone.
Although Premier League sides have now agreed to ban front-of-shirt gambling sponsors from the beginning of the 2026-27 season onwards, the study found that these only accounted for around 7% of the total number of gambling ads recorded.
“Compared to shirt fronts, we identified an array of alternative locations in which gambling-associated logos were visible such as shirt sleeves, the stadium structure, and dynamic pitch-side hoarding,” the paper concluded.
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It added that pitch-side hoardings “were the most frequent marketing location” for all logos, being responsible for more than half of all the ad placements seen on screen.
Led by the University of Chester’s Jamie Torrance, the study looked at all instances of ads and marketing placements for brands within the gambling, cryptocurrency, and financial trading spaces during Premier League broadcasts.
Anti-gambling campaign group The Big Step deplored the report’s findings as a “national shame”, adding that “every one of those 3,500 nudges to gamble is a potential hook into addiction for young fans, their parents and even players. The harm gambling advertising causes is no longer ignorable; the government needs to step in and end all gambling advertising in football.”
