Football sides in England’s elite division could be facing an £80m shirt sponsor shortfall.
That’s according to a report from The Guardian, which has revealed that nine Premier League clubs have still not landed front-of-shirt sponsorship deals for the 2026/27 season amid a whole host of industry changes.
With the voluntary front-of-shirt ban on gambling sponsors in the Premier League coming into force from next season, and an ongoing consultation on the removal of unlicensed operators from British sports altogether, it begs the question – could the door be open for prediction markets to move into the Premier League?
While the likes of Manchester United, Manchester City and Liverpool are all still tied up with non-gambling related deals extending beyond this season, clubs including Chelsea and Newcastle are seeking new sponsors, as deals with IFS and Sela respectively are set to expire at the end of the season.
Bournemouth and Sunderland, who faced each other at the end of February in what Entain Chief Executive Officer Stella David coined ‘the black market derby’, will have to look beyond their existing sponsorship deals with BJ88 and W88.
The Guardian suggested that Bournemouth has entered into an agreement with health insurance provider and current stadium sponsor Vitality – at a lower price – for it to become The Cherries’ front-of-shirt sponsor.
And while SBC’s very own Ted Menmuir and Martyn Elliott suggested on the iGaming Daily Podcast that clubs may turn to crypto sponsors to offset the loss in revenue streams from betting operators, industry veteran Jon Russell hinted that attention could soon be turning to prediction markets – a vertical which has been the subject of many industry debates in the last few weeks.
A Premier League problem?
Despite Russell, formerly the Chair of the IBIA and the Director of Betway Group, stating that the situation is ‘complicated’ and that any potential deal would be problematic, he did say that “prediction market operators have noticed” the Premier League’s sponsorship exodus.
“Polymarket has signed commercial partnerships with LaLiga, MLB, NHL, MLS, UFC and DAZN in the past six months. Kalshi has the NHL,” he wrote on LinkedIn.
“Both are spending aggressively on sports visibility at precisely the moment the most watched sports league in the world’s shirt inventory has opened up.
“There is one problem. The UK Gambling Commission ruled in February that prediction markets are gambling products in Great Britain requiring a UKGC betting intermediary licence to operate. Under that ruling, a prediction market operator sponsoring a Premier League shirt would be in exactly the same category as the gambling brands the ban was designed to remove.
“Polymarket and Kalshi do not accept that they are gambling companies. Their entire legal strategy in the United States has been built around arguing that their products are financial derivatives regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) – not gambling.
“When US states have ruled otherwise, they have litigated. The CFTC filed suits against three states on this basis two days ago.
“They will not quietly accept the UKGC’s classification either. Which means the first serious legal challenge to the UKGC’s February ruling may not come from a prediction market operator directly.
“It may come from a Premier League club that has signed a shirt deal with one of these platforms and finds itself defending that commercial relationship against a regulator that classifies its new sponsor as an unlicensed gambling operator.”
A new challenge for UK regulators
Earlier this week, Entain CEO David penned an article in the Telegraph to warn the industry that the 2026 World Cup could act as “the single largest recruitment drive” for black market operators, emphasising that prediction markets may present a more complex challenge for regulators.
As it stands, both Kalshi and Polymarket describe themselves as financial exchanges – meaning that they don’t fall under the jurisdiction of UK gambling laws. This is a distinction that has been picked up by the Gambling Commission, which has already stated that both companies will be considered as gambling operators should they decide to operate in the UK. As a result, a regulatory grey area has been thrust into the spotlight.
It’s likely that the topic is going to continue to attract more attention as the global demand for prediction markets continues to surge.
Prediction market platforms still stand to benefit from the surge in exposure that they are set to get over the summer – as seen by ADI Predictstreet becoming the Official Prediction Market Partner of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. It could potentially add even more fuel to the fire in terms of a Premier League club hunting for a prediction market operator as a sponsor.
There are a plethora of differences, no doubt, between the black market and prediction markets. However, one of the similarities is that neither hold UKGC licences – and are therefore under no obligation to offer any player protection measures.
Whether Premier League clubs call on prediction markets to sponsor them remains to be seen, as does the scrutiny which they would be under should such a branding opportunity arise.
Russell concluded: “The clubs navigating the replacement sponsor market are walking into a regulatory dispute that has not yet been fought on English legal grounds. The Gambling Act 2005 defines betting differently to the US Commodity Exchange Act.
“A UK court has not yet ruled on whether a prediction market contract constitutes a bet under English law.
“That ruling is coming. The only question is whether it arrives before or after a loss making, PSR conscious Premier League club signs the wrong replacement lucrative deal.”
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