English football clubs have been receiving a portion of the money lost by punters with SkyBet, the Guardian revealed. The reports prompted a strong wave of criticism and accusations that the football clubs are actually exploiting their supporters and people who find it hard to control their gambling.
According to an internal document cited by the Guardian, members of the English Football League (EFL), which currently includes a total of 72 football clubs outside the Premier League (EPL), operated as SkyBet “affiliates”. For the time being, so-called affiliates are acting as middlemen who encourage gamblers to place bets with a certain company and receive a percentage of the money lost by that person in return.
The document states English football clubs received a share of money lost from accounts that were registered in each of the football clubs’ names with SkyBet through an affiliate partnership agreement between the gambling operator and the clubs.
As revealed by the English Football League, the arrangement lasted six years until eventually being scrapped at the beginning of the 2019/2020 season. Still, the EFL admitted that some clubs were still getting money under what it described as “legacy” contracts. According to the league, the clubs are likely to continue cashing in from the aforementioned affiliate partnership agreements with the gambling company until the end of the 2023/2024 season.
Previously, the Guardian has addressed every EPL club, as well as some clubs from the Championship and Scottish Premiership, asking them to reveal whether they had affiliate contracts with any gambling operators. At the time, a number of companies – Manchester United, Crystal Palace, Tottenham Hotspur, and Newcastle United – said that they had no such contracts, while the remaining clubs refused to comment on the matter or did not respond to the question.
Affiliate Deals between Gambling Operators and Professional Football Clubs Face Strong Criticism
The Guardian revealed that one club from League Two generated £5,000 from the affiliate contract on an annual basis. According to reports, that amount indicates that the best-supported Championship clubs are likely to get much larger sums from such partnership agreements.
The relationship between the English Football League clubs and SkyBet has faced criticism from anti-gambling campaigners and Members of Parliament (MPs), who also called EPL clubs to reveal whether they have similar affiliate deals in order to get fresh momentum for the UK Government’s plans to reform the country’s gambling legislation.
SkyBet, which is currently part of the gambling business of Flutter Entertainment, has sponsored the clubs from the English Football League for 10 seasons. Previously, sources close to the local gambling industry alleged there are affiliate deals between bookmakers and football clubs but this is actually the first time when hard evidence of such a relationship and arrangements has been unveiled.
After former Prime Minister Boris Johnson resigned from the position and was replaced by Liz Truss, there have been rumours that the draft white paper of his Cabinet could fall victim to some new policies unveiled by Ms Truss’ Cabinet, which is believed to be prioritising other matters rather than the planned reform of the UK gambling laws.
Alex Davies-Jones, the shadow minister for sport, however, said that the plans should not be dismissed and warned that the recently-emerged evidence of affiliate deals between gambling companies and professional football clubs raised some serious questions regarding the UK Government’s approach to gambling. According to Ms Davies-Jones, the Government had failed to bring forward the much-expected white paper while it was local people who were still being negatively affected by the delay.
- Author
Olivia Cole
