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A daily podcast delving into the biggest stories of the day throughout the sports betting and igaming sector.
speaker-0 (00:00.184)
how important customer acquisition can be for these operators these days, especially in a time of how competitive it is in the UK market. And also with the rising costs of operating in UK market with the increase of remote gaming duty and machine games duty as well, it's putting more pressure on these operators to find a way to retain customers and also to acquire customers. And for an operator like Midnight to capture our attention, it's certainly shown that they're doing something right.
speaker-2 (00:30.776)
2026-2027 championship season begins tonight as Wolves begin their attempt to bounce straight back to the Premier League as they host Blackburn at Molyneux. England's second tier has always offered operators, not least title sponsor Skybet, a sponsorship opportunity. But with the Premier League's front of shirt ban now in effect, the championship has an opportunity to take centre stage. So why is the championship so popular for operators and how can brands make the most of their exposure this season?
Welcome back to iGaming Daily, supported by Optimove, the creator of positionless marketing and the number one player engagement solution for sports betting and iGaming operators. I'm Charlie Horner and to discuss all of this with me today is SBC News' Patrick Colleen and iGaming Expert's Connor Porter. Patrick, how are you?
speaker-1 (01:19.864)
Yeah, good thanks mate. Looking forward to EFL again because even though the championship is probably more Connors Forte, it means that League 2 is also not far away so I've got another season of pain watching Oldham.
speaker-2 (01:32.376)
Fantastic. Well, hey, it's the E the E E F L one of the best competitions in the world, so don't don't don't knock League two. Connor, how are you?
speaker-0 (01:39.918)
I'm doing good Charlie, yeah. Excited for the championship to be back on our screens. It's one of my favourite divisions in the whole of world football because of how competitive it is and it looks as though gambling operators are trying to be competitive in that market as well.
speaker-2 (01:53.538)
Yeah. Championship got a lot more fun. Now Sunderland and Nottingham Forest aren't in there. Yeah. So yeah. Well let's let's dive into this because I think it's a really interesting topic, not least because the championship is back, but because the Premier League is banning front of shirt sponsorships.
So there is an opportunity for championship clubs to to maybe cash in and and get some get some exposure, but also an opportunity for operators who want to get a national and international exposure through the championship. Patrick, you you've written about this for SBC News. let's have an overview, shall we, of which championship clubs have have partnered with operators ahead of this season.
speaker-1 (02:31.916)
Yeah, so Stoke have obviously continued their affiliation with Bet365. Midnight are a big one at the moment. They've partnered with a few clubs, Wolves, Middlesbrough, Southampton and Sheff United, with three of those being front of shirt sponsorships.
speaker-2 (02:37.912)
Right.
speaker-1 (02:51.202)
Both relegated clubs, obviously Wolves just mentioned, but West Ham and Boyle Sports are continuing it because obviously the front of shirt ban, if West Ham would have stayed up, they wouldn't have been allowed that sponsorship. But with them going down, then it's provided an opportunity for Boyle Sports. And Coral is an interesting one with Birmingham because it's their first front of shirt deal in their 100 year history, I think.
speaker-2 (03:15.576)
Yeah, fascinating why they've chosen to do that at this at this stage. We might delve into some of the reasons why, but but yeah.
speaker-1 (03:22.222)
And the other one is Mr Q and QPR which has a bit of history and kind of makes a little bit of sense as much as people might not like front shirt gambling sponsorships then Mr Q to target QPR makes a lot more sense than
speaker-2 (03:37.262)
Yeah, I absolutely and there's th there's more as well, not just front of shirts, but there are other partnerships. I think Blackburn, Blackburn, Cardiff, Charlton, Derby, Millwall, Preston. So many clubs.
speaker-1 (03:50.05)
Yeah, there's a lot of short sponsorships and back of shirt sponsorships and like club betting partner sponsorships, that's the interesting thing really, which you'll probably get onto a bit later. They're becoming more prevalent in the championship as the championship's stature grows worldwide, I think.
speaker-2 (04:07.746)
Yeah, absolutely. And it it just goes to show that the the championship is a is a huge brand now. Connor, how how big of an impact do you think that the Premier League front of shirt ban has had on the prevalence of of these deals in the championship, particularly those ones on on the front of shirt?
speaker-0 (04:23.5)
Well, I think it's a bit of a mixed answer to this because you've listed off a load of front of shirts deals that have occurred this off season, pretty much in the championship. But when you look back at last year's, it's a similar number. actually like, might actually be the exactly same number of just seven front of shirts. The only difference is that we've kind of got more of midnight pushing through.
with their sponsorships and how they've progressed as a newish operator on the scene and how they've been pushing the boundaries in terms of their sponsorship deals. then also, you mentioned about teams going down from the Premier League, teams have gone down from the Championship Two in Leicester City and Sheffield Wednesday. They both had sponsorships last season of BC Game and Mr Vegas respectively on their front of shirts. they were lost. And then you've got other teams as well that have changed their front of shirt sponsorships.
So to a different gambling operator, Middlesbrough had Uni-bet, they're now with Midnight. QPR, you mentioned already with Mr. Q, they had copy bet. So it's a bit of a of shape there. But also you've got the presence of Stoke City with bet 365. That's been a long standing relationship because of the ownership structure there previously. And also with the fact that it's...
named the Bet365 Stadium too. So that's just another extension on the sponsorship really of the division as well as the fact that it is the Skybet Championship in essence. there's plenty of sponsors there. So in terms of like the impact of the Front of Shirt ban, it might be a bit more prevalent because we're talking about it more in the media.
But in terms of how, in essence, it's changed in the championship, I don't think it's really changed that much. To be honest, it's more had a bigger impact in terms of how we're looking at sponsorship in the Premier League with Premier League teams. And we'll get more into that later on.
speaker-2 (06:18.818)
Certainly. I mean this is this is nothing new, is it?
speaker-1 (06:21.774)
I think, yeah sorry, I was gonna say I think what, just to come off the back of what Conor said is, he's completely correct, you know, it might have been, I might have been guilty of over blowing it a little bit, especially the front of shirt thing, but what you, what's interesting is that it has grown from 2022, 23, and that was the season before the front of shirt band was announced. So you're seeing a gradual increase, I think it was four or five that season.
So maybe there's been a period, a little bit of a period of testing the waters almost. And now this is only going to get bigger up until maybe the point that a further bank comes in. But, you know, we'll have to kind of monitor it. Maybe that's coming to the back of the minds of a few operators as well. yeah, there's massive change in the clubs from last season, but still, as Connor says, it's not massively impacted the numbers of of shirt deal.
speaker-2 (07:18.03)
But it it just goes to show that though that there is this huge commercial appeal in the championship. Skybet have certainly seen value in that over the last however many years they've been the title sponsor of it. maybe let's just talk a little bit about the commercial appeal of the championship. You know, there's a there's a real mix of clubs. There's clubs that have
become global brands because they've recently been in the Premier League and and have come down. There's there's teams like Lincoln who were very regional and have just come up fr from League One. and and I think it's quite interesting that last season twelve point four million people attended championship games. That's the third highest attended league in in Europe. what what do you think about the commercial appeal of of the championship in that in that aspect? Patrick, do you want to go first?
speaker-1 (08:04.694)
What's the second highest league? it the Bundesliga? Right. Yeah, as you say, it's growing in. mean, it's always been. Football in England is massively well known for how strong the pyramid is. I think stats vary, don't they? But I think it's like the seventh most lucrative league in the world. Third highest attendance. But there's also that TV presence now. The partnership with Skybet, whether it's played a part in Sky Sports.
speaker-2 (08:07.372)
I believe it's the Bundesliga.
speaker-1 (08:35.086)
kind of push of EFL football. You've got Sky Sports Plus and so many televised games. think Friday night, I think all three of us would associate with championship match. you know, that's a small group of people who have had to be subject to EFL football for the vast majority of their lives. that, it's probably a thing, a common theme throughout at least this country. And clearly it's growing throughout.
throughout the world, think, especially the commercial appeal for someone like Midnight as well, where they're at the moment just UK focused, it's massive because Sky Sports, the UK TV audience will be inflated because of how many games are on television. And it is an opportunity at maybe a cut price from what would be a Premier League sponsorship deal. And whilst the global reach won't be quite as big.
because obviously we know how big the Premier League is, there's more than enough opportunities to kind of capture attention through the championship and potentially even through lower down than that, although the championship obviously gets more coverage in the lower league.
speaker-2 (09:48.846)
And I guess if you're a y a a UK only operator, you don't really need that global presence, do you?
speaker-0 (09:55.01)
Yeah, just going to jump in and just kind of mention more about what you saying about the mix of club sizes really in a championship. When we look at these sponsorships, though, they tend to have stayed within a certain select of clubs this season, which is teams that have been relegated from the Premier League in the last decade or so. The only exception really is Birmingham City. And I think that is because, well, the gravitas of the club is still pretty much there as well.
You know, it's in one of the biggest cities in the UK and also it's got one of the most outspoken Ownerships in football at the moment
very big ambitions, as you mentioned, know, Tom Wagner and Tom Brady leading the charge there. They got the big ambition plans for a new stadium too. And so why wouldn't a brand with such historic prestige like Coral, why wouldn't they want to be attached to that making? And it's the same with like all these other clubs throughout the division that have got their operators partnered with them. Why wouldn't they want to be attached to a potential promotion winning campaign with these clubs?
some of them have only just come down from the Premier League as we already mentioned with Wolves and West Ham. Queens Park Rangers, I think that was like close to 10 years ago now that they were in Premier League, but Stoke and Sheffield United and Middlesbrough, they've all been in that region of the last decade as well in the Premier League. there's certainly an appeal to be part of a team that gets promoted and certainly to have part of the branding.
in that message of promotion of good times as well for the team is certainly a big appeal for these operators.
speaker-2 (11:35.488)
I I think an another point I'd I'd like to add to that is a lot of these teams are quite embedded in their communities. They're well they're well supported, there's plenty of attendance, but is the is these partnerships are very focused on the fans of those clubs. And I think one of the operators who have done this really well i is Midnight and they they're you know they've partnered with with
Borough, Wolves, Southampton, there's one more as well. Sheffield United, yeah, some of the biggest teams in the league. And it seems like they they are going very fan first with some of their initiatives. I know when it came to the playoff campaign at the end of last season, they were putting on fan buses and things like that, making sure that that away fans could get to to the ground at a decent price. So I think they might have fully subsidised the cost of those those travel plans. I
I guess they've put the championship at the heart of their marketing strategy. What do we know about Midnight's plans for growth in the UK and why do you think that partnering with championship clubs of of that size and stature makes so much sense? Do you have any insight on that comment?
speaker-0 (12:41.302)
I think it makes sense for them to partner with these clubs similar to what I said on the fact that these clubs are ambitious towards promotion. They want to be attached to that, but also Midnight itself, it's looking to book the trend of lot of operators. It's essentially looking to be similar to what Paddy Power is in terms of that, not necessarily outlandish, but...
Different, differentiating in terms of marketing and you know, you've already mentioned about the away day travels. I know earlier in this preseason, they did stuff with walls when it comes to like a trivia night in which fans could win season tickets for the team or they could get themselves a shirt if they were to be unfortunate losers in that trivia. So there's those kind of activations really that are working well, I for midnight and it's getting them the attention. But then beyond that as well with midnight, you have
cash your mind back to last season. think they did like the 115 charges scarf as well for the I think it was one of the Manchester United games or the Arsenal games. Obviously that's related to Manchester City and we'll leave that there for another time. But this is I think for for midnight with like in terms of fan engagement is is is their real emphasis as an operator with with these sponsorships and you know talking about.
how important customer acquisition can be for these operators these days, especially in a time of how competitive it is in the UK market. And also with the rising costs of operating in UK market with the increase of remote gaming duty and machine games duty as well, it's putting more pressure on these operators to find a way to retain customers and also to acquire customers. And for an operator like Midnight to capture our attention, it's certainly shown that they're doing something right.
speaker-2 (14:26.478)
Sure.
speaker-1 (14:28.994)
It's funny to see the kind of variety of Midnight and its marketing strategies at the moment. I mean, we saw yesterday it did get stung by the ASA, but that came off the back of a variety of different adverts in TV, radio. There's a clear push and we know it got a lot of funding towards the start of the year, but it's spacing it out in quite a unique way.
we know they've got their affiliation with the snooker tour, which you would probably more associate with like the old heads of sport. But again, it's pushing massively on social media platforms. So there's a real contrast, but I mean, like Conor's just explained about the Wolves thing, they're still trying to connect with the fans. We know how closely they work with the World Snooker Tour. So I mean, if you're...
It's not just a fire sale, a spree of, that's available, we'll get that, this is available, we'll get that. It's still targeted and they're still serving the audience in a way that makes the sponsorship valuable for both them and the fans. And I wonder if that will work to their advantage too.
speaker-0 (15:44.074)
Even with the Snookitor, they changed the cue ball color, didn't they, to lime green, which caught the attention of so many people. they're going, hang on, what's going on here? Why is the cue ball lime green? And they go, it's midnight. Who's midnight?
speaker-1 (15:55.672)
There's a space thing as well, weren't there, where they put the app in space.
speaker-2 (15:59.95)
Well, there you go, a challenger brand associating themselves with Challenger teams and Challenger sports. But Patrick, Connor, we'll take a quick break and we'll come back and we'll continue the discussion. Learn how Optimove's positionless marketing is changing how iGaming teams operate. Discover how operators are using Optimus' positionless marketing platform to launch personalized CRM campaigns, dynamically change casino lobbies and bet slips, and create engaging gamified experiences. Learn more at Optimove.com. Welcome back to iGaming Daily. We're talking today about the championship and some of the betting spiritual.
sponsorships that are within it. one one thing that really s sort of catapulted the championship in in the last couple of years was the new TV deal that the championship or the or the EFL signed with Sky Sports. I think that's worth nearly a billion pounds over five years. Sky Sports launched a new channel, Sky Sports Plus. There's now I think about a thousand games being shown across the season across all of the different EFL competitions, Championship League One, League Two.
EFL Cup and the EFL Trophy. that means that you can't really go a day on Sky Sports without seeing some EFL content. Most of that is championship. Do you think that that ex it like increased exposure via that TV deal has has provided a boost that operators want to sort of piggy piggyback on? Patrick, what do you think? Yeah.
speaker-1 (17:20.001)
I mean, obviously, like, there's more games, then you've got more chance of reaching more people, right? I would have to see the viewing figures of Sky Sports Plus, I mean, if you go into any pub or anywhere like that, and there's no Premier League on, there's almost definitely gonna be Championship or League One or League Two on, you know, somewhere, so...
I think there's a chance of reaching more people through these sort of deals. if you think with the, I know we talk about Sky Sports Plus there, but some of the clubs that have these front-shirt gambling sponsors like West Ham, Wolves, Birmingham, they're clubs that are much talked about in the championship. They're the bigger clubs or the more popular clubs because of recent events. So to have kind of...
Skysports main event coverage or Skysports football coverage is massively important I think.
speaker-2 (18:23.374)
Yeah, absolutely. Connor, please.
speaker-0 (18:24.886)
Yeah, it's certainly big for these clubs.
just for themselves to have the extra coverage. And obviously it benefits the sponsors, not just gambling operators, but the sponsors in general to have that additional exposure. And plus, let's not forget the fact that we're going to have additional playoffs spots this coming season. So even more games to be shown in the last stages of the year. And with that will be even more additional exposure for sponsors and gambling operators if they are part of those teams that are fortunate enough to be in those lucrative positions in the championship.
speaker-2 (18:59.106)
Yeah, talking about promotion and and the playoffs, Patrick you've made a really interesting point off air about promotion and how that might impact the the length of some of these contracts. Do you want to just explain a little bit about that?
speaker-1 (19:11.15)
Yeah, I'll probably have to give a little bit of credit to Callum from Payment Expert for that one. But, you know, it's a strange situation, especially for a lot of the clubs that are sponsored, because you think they're the ambitious ones that want to get promotion. You know, you're not talking about clubs that are consistently bottom half or fighting against the drop. You're talking about your Wolves and West Ham's who will almost definitely, I mean, don't quote me on this, but be the two favourites to win the league. And Middlesbrough as well.
Sheffield United, Southampton. the front of shirt deal kind of has to be a little bit shorter and that's obviously at the detriment of the football club because you can't sign a multi-year deal with West Ham who you would expect to be in the Premier League next season. And it makes it a little bit tricky about potentially signing these multi-year deals unless you're with a club that...
You would almost definitely expect not to get promotion. And even if a championship club does do that, are you thinking in the back of your mind as a fan, are we not ambitious enough to go up this season? So it's a strange one really. it would give the operator, so Midnight or a Coral, if their team or one of the teams that they've sponsored does stay down, it would give you a chance to evaluate that sponsorship, what you've got out of it, because you're not locked into a deal over three or four years.
But yeah, it's a strange one and it didn't really come to my mind until today thinking about something like that.
speaker-0 (20:44.664)
think maybe with these deals that may be multi-year in length, surely it's got to have some verbiage within the contract itself to say, okay, if we were to get promoted to the Premier League and therefore no longer be able to do a front-of-shirt sponsorship, we can pivot to Training Kit or ESL. Because I a lot of them can be just the one-year deal rotation kind of thing. But certainly if a bigger team...
such as in West Ham's case that had been in the Premier League for such a long time, if they were to get relegated, surely they're going to have a longer term deal sponsorship because of the fact that they're in London and the fact that they got dozens of followers on, more than dozens, millions of followers on social media. Just a couple of handful from London. it's certainly got to be...
speaker-2 (21:31.98)
Thirty or forty.
speaker-0 (21:40.084)
some sort of verbiage within the contract itself, I think, to pivot to those training kit or sleeve deals in future cases if they were to get promoted.
speaker-2 (21:48.034)
And we are seeing that in the Premier League at the minute. But it's an interesting quirk of of the regulation in in the Premier League that there's even less certainty in in the championship. But yeah, just talking about the front of shirt ban in the Premier League, w we are seeing training kit deals, we're seeing sleeve deals. Slowly but surely all the clubs are starting to replace their betting brands on the front of shirt. I think there's still a couple of clubs out there who haven't done so yet. A Forrest
speaker-0 (22:15.694)
No, we don't have any sponsorships at the moment, but if it gets announced in the next couple of hours, we'll look at it.
speaker-2 (22:18.1)
Not that not the disunderland.
speaker-2 (22:24.746)
A silly. Silly, yeah. but yeah, do do you think that the f with the the front of shirt ban coming in and and sort of betting brands appearing on training kits and sleeves and perimeters and things like that, do you think it sort of renders the front of shirt sponsorship ban a little bit redundant, Patrick?
speaker-1 (22:42.99)
In a way, yeah. I think, you know, after coming into the industry I took a little bit more notice of how prevalent gambling brands are in the Premier League. I remember watching Sunderland vs. Forrest and what you notice is the advertising boards around the side are just filled with gambling sponsorships but it's tricky because there's still value in them. I think Joe said as well
that the value is there in training kit deals because of how prevalent they are on social media. Or something like Sky Sports News, that's where you're be seeing them, even like mainstream news. So it's not like this ban is gonna make gambling sponsors or gambling companies as much as they will have been a little bit railed by it. It's not gonna make them go, this is doomsday, because it's far from it.
you've got so many different opportunities and I think it's kind of made them, much as some people might not want to hear it, it's kind of made them get a little bit creative with some of the deals and you will still definitely see a presence of gambling operators in the Premier League, whether it be on training kits, whether it be around the stadium, whether it be on sleeves, on shorts, in TV ad breaks, it's not just going to go away, you're not going to eliminate.
sponsorships and that again, know, kind of going off on a little bit of a tangent here, but is why it's all the more important to eliminate unlicensed operators from sponsoring Premier League, because it's not going anywhere, anywhere soon really.
speaker-2 (24:26.668)
Yeah, it's we're we're definitely a creative industry, I think that's fair to say. So if there's a if there is a a way around a you know, a rule or the front of shirt first piece this yeah, they'll they'll find a way to to get sponsorship and visibility. Connor, just on that, really, on on the topic of of regulation and things like that. we're seeing Andy Burnham come in as prime minister. We we we've seen that Vicky Foxcroft is now the new gambling minister.
speaker-1 (24:36.845)
Be fine.
speaker-2 (24:55.992)
We're not getting the greatest of vibes that they're the the friendliest characters towards the gambling sector. What do you think marketing directors and major operators will will be thinking of? What do you think they'll have to do to adapt to changing regulations and potential advertising restrictions that might come down the track in the future? I think
speaker-0 (25:14.23)
In the short term, I think they'll just continue as they are really for now. But like more longer term is a bit uncertain, especially with as already mentioned earlier about the cost of the duty increases. That's going to have a more bigger impact, I think, and a bigger influence on marketing strategy for a lot of operators in the future rather than say a front of shirt sponsorship ban occurring. But like in terms of marketing direction, I think we are going to see a lot more of the training kit kind of stuff because of
the factors that you mentioned about it being more prevalent on social media and therefore having a bigger impact in terms of a deal. So I think we're gonna go more into that direction. I think we're gonna see a lot more operators exploring the different kinds of activities that they can do with fans and clubs and all to put their brand out there and hope that that turns into
to customer acquisition and retention because the competition in the UK market, I think overall, because of regulations is gonna get a bit more competitive. The duty is gonna rise up costs in terms of operators and how they adjust their strategies and budgets. And so it's gonna have a knock-on effect, I think, onto everything else, especially in marketing.
speaker-2 (26:36.846)
Sure. Well I think that's a a good spot to leave it. We're sort of running out of time, but before we do go, Patrick, who's gonna win the championship?
speaker-0 (26:47.214)
Because of my Birmingham Hospital radio stuff, I'm gonna have to say Wolves, West Brom and Birmingham City are all gonna get promoted this season. I'm not gonna say who wins because that will just...
speaker-2 (26:57.14)
Yeah. Yeah. You got you got no no allegiances. Just just the entirety of the Western. Yeah, well done. I'll go Middlesbrough and with that
speaker-1 (27:04.438)
Yeah.
speaker-0 (27:09.248)
Sunderland Fancy Middlesbrough. Wow. Never thought I'd see that.
speaker-2 (27:12.246)
Not rivals. They're actually in Yorkshire. So there's there's one for you. Leave it then. We'll leave there. thank you ever so much, Patrick. Thank you, Connor, for joining me today. Thanks to Optimu for supporting the show and to our listeners. Thanks ever so much for tuning in to today's episode of iGaming Daily. Come back next week to keep up to date with all the latest global gambling news.