At the time of writing, Profit & Sustainability Rules (PSR) allow football clubs in England and beyond to record a loss of up to £105 million over a three-year rolling period without facing any sanctions. When calculating profit to offset any losses, clubs are allowed to count player sales and amortisation, owner funding (up to £90 million) and other commercial revenues, including cuts of TV deals and broadcasting rights, ticket sales and merchandising.
Under the banner of merchandising comes kit manufacturing and sponsorship deals, which are often seen as an ‘easy win’ by clubs seeking to maximise their revenue – after all, it costs them nothing to display the branding of a company on the front of their playing shirt… aside from any moral contention there may be about the firm in question.
Premier League PSR watchers can rejoice, as the 2025/26 season will see EPL clubs rake in a record when it comes to kit deals – a collective £600 million, no less. But with more than 50% of clubs sponsored by gambling operators, with a handful more wearing the branding of unregulated cryptocurrency exchanges on their shirts, has the race to maximise sponsorship revenue finally gone too far?
A Nice Little Earner
📝 𝗗𝗘𝗔𝗟 𝗗𝗢𝗡𝗘: Liverpool have agreed a multi-year kit deal with Adidas worth over £60m a season. pic.twitter.com/yEqJYzzITt
— Football Tweet ⚽ (@Football__Tweet) March 10, 2025
It probably won’t surprise you to learn that the absolute vast majority of that £600 million has been collected by the biggest, most widely supported clubs. In fact, £563 million of the total – around 93% – has been accumulated by half of the Premier League’s 20 clubs… leaving the other ten sharing out a relatively miniscule, in this context, £37 million.
Manchester City and Liverpool will collect £100 million apiece from their deals with Puma and Adidas, which will surpass £1 billion each over the entire course of their contract, while Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal will also rake in big bucks from Adidas and Nike. By way of context, newly-promoted Sunderland’s new kit will be made by Danish outfit Hummel, who pay just £500,000 per season for the privilege.
Adidas will have their name associated with as many as eight Premier League clubs in 2025/26, so the hundreds of millions forked out will likely be recouped via other commercial avenues. Indeed, the German manufacturer has enjoyed early season success courtesy of Liverpool’s new kit launch, which according to reports has seen a 700% increase in sales compared to the 2024 edition – aided, no doubt, by the Reds’ status as defending Premier League champions.
Many Liverpool fans have chosen to buy the new shirt and have ‘Jota’ printed on the back, in respect to the Portuguese striker who tragically lost his life in 2025. The Reds have confirmed that the money generated from such sales will be donated to the LFC Foundation.
Gambling on a Quick Buck
Once upon a time, top division football teams were sponsored by household names – Carlsberg, Pizza Hut, Walkers Crisps, JVC and Dr Martens just some of the brands to lend their logos (and cash) to Premier League clubs. But in recent years, there’s been a change in modus operandi. Now, clubs want to make as much money as possible from their sponsorship deals… with no care for what sector their benefactors operate in.
Most Don’t Even Operate in the UK
That perhaps explains why eleven out of 19 Premier League sides (Chelsea didn’t have a deal at the time of writing) are sponsored by gambling firms – despite a voluntary ban on such deals kicking in at the start of the 2026/27 campaign. But these aren’t big name UK brands, for the most part. In fact, UK based punters can’t even legally bet with the likes of Stake, bj88 and SBOTOP, for the simple reason that they don’t even have a UK operating licence.
These firms, often based in Australasia, instead leverage the huge TV audiences that the Premier League gets around the world to advertise their Instant Casino services to customers in their own jurisdiction – with no interest in penetrating the UK market at all.
Curiously, English football clubs that are seen to promote unlicensed gambling – which they would be doing in showcasing the branding of an operator without a UK licence – can be prosecuted by the Gambling Commission. However, despite issuing warnings, the regulator is yet to actually act accordingly… despite a number of clubs continuing to flaunt the rules. Nottingham Forest have now swapped the unlicensed Kaiyun Sports for the licensed Bally’s.
Will Cryptocurrency Be the Next to Feature?
Perhaps clubs will deviate from gambling to cryptocurrency once the voluntary ban kicks in… although that might be construed as equally problematic. The cryptocurrency niche is unregulated, meaning that its exchange platforms can operate without any undue regulatory pressure. One such firm, BTC Mining Ltd, was shut down by UK government officials following a string of complaints about the misappropriation of customer funds.
Another crypto firm, Coinbase, lost £300 million of customer funds when it was hacked earlier in 2025. Two of the biggest clubs in England, Manchester City and Tottenham, have confirmed that crypto firms OKX and Kraken respectively will feature as their sleeve sponsor in 2025/26.
The Changing Face of Football Sponsorship
The difference in sponsorship brands in 2025/26, compared to the Premier League’s inaugural season in 1992/93, is stark. Back then, the EPL was a 22-team competition, with the largest sector engaging in shirt sponsorship being technology – 8/22 came from that sphere. There were also agreements between Premier League clubs and firms in automotive care, construction, chemicals, fashion, pharmaceuticals and more.
Of course, that’s not to say there wasn’t some controversy in the fact that Liverpool, Tottenham, Nottingham Forest and Blackburn Rovers were sponsored by brands behind popular alcoholic beverages. But 18/22 clubs had non-alcohol based sponsorships, or 81% if you prefer. Fast forward to 2025/26 and you’ll note that 11/19 deals – or 58% – are specifically with gambling firms.
Gambling sponsors are prohibited in Spain’s La Liga, while in other top European leagues they account for around 15% of all deals – significantly less than in the Premier League. The Premier League emphasises that they want ‘children and young people to have the right to participate in a safe, respectful, and enjoyable environment.’ But when they’re being touted gambling and crypto trading on a weekly basis, as well as booze all those years ago, can Premier League chiefs really believe that they are delivering a family-friendly product?
