Gambling-linked sponsors remain on 14 of 18 Belgian football shirts despite advertising crackdown

Gambling sponsorship in Belgian football has once again become a political issue after Verlinden strongly criticised clubs and sports organisations that continue to work with companies from the gambling sector.

Her cabinet argues that clubs have had a lengthy transition period in which to seek alternative sources of financing.

According to the minister, their continued dependence on businesses connected to gambling demonstrates a lack of social responsibility, particularly when considered alongside the risks gambling can pose to minors and vulnerable players.

There is nevertheless an important distinction to make.

Verlinden is the federal Justice Minister, but she is no longer the minister responsible for the Belgian Gaming Commission. Following the Commission's transfer from FPS Justice to FPS Economy, formal oversight of the gambling regulator now sits within the economic portfolio.

Her comments therefore represent a political position on sports sponsorship rather than a legal ruling on the arrangements currently used by Belgian football clubs.

It remains up to the Belgian Gaming Commission to determine whether individual sponsorship structures comply with the country's gambling advertising rules.

The most striking development is not necessarily that gambling companies remain connected to football, but how that connection has changed.

Traditional casino and sportsbook names are increasingly being replaced by affiliated brands.

Circus Casino, for example, is represented through Circus Daily. Napoleon Sports & Casino is connected to Napoleon Score, while Golden Palace uses Golden Palace News.

Other examples include PepperMill & Friends linked to PepperMill Casino, Star Casino TV linked to Star Casino, 777 TV and betsson.sport.

These names are generally positioned as media outlets, sports platforms or other services rather than websites on which consumers can directly place bets or play casino games.

From a marketing perspective, the advantage is obvious.

The gambling operator itself may disappear from the shirt, while a brand belonging to the same wider commercial ecosystem continues to receive visibility in stadiums, television broadcasts, photographs and sports media.

From a legal perspective, however, the situation is less straightforward.

The existence of a connection with a gambling company does not automatically make an affiliated brand illegal.

A casino group can own or finance another business without every advertisement for that business necessarily becoming gambling advertising.

The Gaming Commission may therefore need to look at several factors, including the visual identity of the brand, its relationship with the gambling operator, the content it provides and whether consumers are ultimately directed toward gambling products.

That distinction is crucial.

A genuine sports news platform operated by a gambling group is not necessarily the same thing as a casino advertisement with a different logo.

At the same time, regulators will have to determine whether certain brands are sufficiently independent or whether they effectively preserve the visibility that Belgium's advertising restrictions were designed to remove.

This is likely to become one of the most important tests of the country's new advertising framework.

Our review of the 18 clubs illustrates just how widespread the phenomenon has become.

RSC Anderlecht displays Napoleon Score on the back of its shirt, while Royal Antwerp FC, KAA Gent and Standard Liège feature Circus Daily.

SK Beveren and KV Kortrijk are associated with PepperMill & Friends, while Cercle Brugge and RAAL La Louvière display Golden Palace News.

Star Casino TV is particularly visible, appearing on the shirts of KRC Genk, Lommel SK and OH Leuven.

Elsewhere, Club Brugge features betsson.sport and KVC Westerlo displays 777 TV.

Sporting Charleroi is the most unusual example because it combines two gambling-related names. Napoleon Score appears on the front of the shirt, while Unibet is displayed on the upper back.

Only KV Mechelen, STVV, Union Saint-Gilloise and Zulte Waregem had no gambling-linked shirt brand identified in the review.

The overall figure is striking: 14 clubs out of 18, or almost eight in ten teams, continue to provide shirt visibility to a brand associated with a gambling operator.

The presence of Unibet at Sporting Charleroi deserves particular attention.

Napoleon Score fits the broader trend of using an affiliated sports-oriented brand instead of the gambling operator's principal commercial identity.

Unibet is different.

It is directly the brand under which gambling and sports betting products are marketed.

Its appearance therefore raises a separate regulatory question from the one surrounding brands such as Circus Daily or Golden Palace News.

The two models should not automatically be treated as equivalent.

 It is equally important not to present this as behaviour adopted by all Belgian online casinos and licensed gambling operators. 

Several operators appear to have taken a different approach.

CasinoBelgium.be, CasinoMagic and Ladbrokes, for example, were not among the operators identified in our review as using a comparable satellite media or sports brand on the shirts of the 18 clubs examined.

That deserves recognition.

Belgium's advertising restrictions apply significant commercial pressure to licensed operators, particularly those competing with offshore gambling websites that do not respect the same rules. Developing an affiliated sports or media brand may therefore be an attractive way of preserving visibility.

But the fact that some operators have not adopted such a strategy shows that it is not inevitable.

There is a meaningful difference between reducing brand exposure in response to tighter regulation and creating a new commercial identity that allows much of the previous sports visibility to continue.

Operators such as CasinoBelgium, CasinoMagic, Ladbrokes and others that have not been identified using these arrangements should therefore not be placed in the same category as those actively testing the boundaries of indirect sports branding.

If companies can adapt to stricter advertising rules without creating a substitute brand for football sponsorship, that is worth acknowledging.

The debate should focus on the practice itself, not become a blanket criticism of Belgium's licensed gambling industry.

The current situation exists partly because Belgium introduced its restrictions gradually.

Gambling advertising in sports environments has already been heavily curtailed, while sponsorship appearing on sports clothing has benefited from a transitional regime.

That transition ends on 1 January 2028, when gambling brands are due to disappear from sports shirts completely.

It is precisely this long adjustment period that frustrates Verlinden.

From her perspective, football clubs have had sufficient time to diversify their commercial partnerships and reduce their reliance on gambling money.

But the industry appears to have adapted in an unexpected direction.

Instead of simply withdrawing from football, several operators have developed or promoted brands that do not themselves offer gambling products.

The regulatory challenge is therefore changing.

The question is no longer simply whether a casino logo can appear on a shirt. It is whether a company closely linked to that casino can do so instead.

The government's objective of protecting minors and vulnerable consumers is legitimate.

However, the criticism directed at private gambling companies also exposes a broader question about consistency in Belgian sports sponsorship.

One example is the Lotto Women's Pro League.

The National Lottery has a different legal status from private casino and sportsbook operators, and the regulatory framework governing the two is not identical.

But that legal distinction is considerably less obvious from the perspective of an ordinary football supporter.

Lotto remains a brand associated with games in which consumers stake money in the hope of winning a prize, yet its name is directly attached to a professional football competition.

At the same time, private gambling companies face increasingly severe restrictions on their visibility within the same sporting environment.

If the debate were purely about legal classifications, this difference would be easier to explain.

Verlinden's appeal to the social responsibility of football clubs, however, takes the discussion beyond strict legal compliance.

And that makes the comparison difficult to ignore.

The contradiction becomes even more visible when looking at Belgium's most prominent football competition.

The country's leading men's championship is still officially called the Jupiler Pro League.

Jupiler is a beer brand owned by AB InBev.

Its association with Belgian football is so established that the commercial nature of the name is easily forgotten. Yet this is not simply a small sponsor logo appearing somewhere on a football shirt.

The brand forms part of the official name of the league itself.

It is repeated in broadcasts, newspaper articles, online coverage, fixtures, league tables and promotional campaigns throughout the season.

None of this means that gambling and alcohol create identical risks or that both industries should necessarily be governed by exactly the same legislation.

But if the principle is that professional sport should avoid normalising commercial products that carry significant social or health risks, then the question logically extends beyond gambling.

The National Lottery has a particular legal status. Alcohol and gambling are subject to different regulatory frameworks. Private casinos and bookmakers face restrictions that cannot simply be copied and applied to every other sector.

Those distinctions matter.

But once policymakers invoke concepts such as social responsibility, public exposure and the protection of vulnerable audiences, the debate becomes broader than the technical wording of gambling legislation.

It is difficult to criticise football clubs for remaining financially dependent on gambling-related companies without also examining the commercial environment in which those clubs operate.

A league sponsored by Jupiler and a women's competition carrying the Lotto name demonstrate that potentially sensitive commercial sectors remain deeply integrated into Belgian professional sport.

The question is therefore not whether gambling deserves regulation.

It clearly does.

The more difficult question is whether the underlying principles are being applied consistently.

Belgium's restrictions have already succeeded in significantly reducing conventional gambling advertising.

But the emergence of Circus Daily, Napoleon Score, Golden Palace News and similar brands shows how quickly commercial strategies can evolve.

This places the Belgian Gaming Commission in a difficult position.

A rule that is too broad could potentially prohibit legitimate media activities simply because they are owned by a gambling company.

A rule that is too narrow, on the other hand, could allow operators to recreate almost exactly the same brand visibility through carefully designed affiliated companies.

Regulators will therefore have to distinguish between genuine independent commercial activities and structures that primarily function as substitutes for prohibited gambling advertising.

That will not always be easy.

The controversy shows why gambling advertising policy cannot be judged solely by counting casino logos.

On paper, gambling brands are progressively disappearing from Belgian sport.

In practice, the commercial links between gambling companies and football remain extensive.

Fourteen of the 18 clubs examined still carry a brand associated with a gambling operator, although the precise nature of those relationships varies considerably.

At the same time, it is important to recognise that not all licensed operators have pursued these indirect branding strategies. Companies such as CasinoBelgium.be, CasinoMagic and Ladbrokes demonstrate that the sector should not be treated as a single bloc.

The coming years will therefore be a test for both regulators and football clubs.

Belgium must determine how far its advertising restrictions extend beyond the gambling brand itself, while clubs must prepare for a future in which traditional gambling sponsorship becomes increasingly difficult to maintain.

And policymakers will face a broader question that is unlikely to disappear in 2028: