KNVB chooses Eurojackpot as a new sponsor, while politics wants to separate the gambling industry and football

In the coming years, Eurojackpot will be the main sponsor of three KNVB competitions: the cup tournament for men and women and the Eredivisie for Women. The football association announced this on Tuesday. At the same time, it is prohibited by 1 July for online gambling companies to sponsor football clubs and sporting events. Can the KNVB go into the sea with a lottery?

Back to Easter Monday: In the Rotterdam Kuip, AZ and Go Ahead Eagles are preparing for the final of the KNVB cup, the prize to which gambling company Toto has been connected to its name as a sponsor for years. Both finalists also adorn their shirt with gambling providers: AZ with Kansino and Go Ahead Eagles with Betnation.

In addition to the clubs from Alkmaar and Deventer, Almere City, Fortuna Sittard, PEC Zwolle, FC Volendam, Vitesse, MVV and Telstar were also sponsored by a gambling company this season. It is a commercially happy marriage, football and gambling companies: the clubs gained more income, while the companies saw the number of (young) customers increasing.

In 2024, Dutch households spent a total of 4.4 billion euros on gambling and games of chance. In 2021 that was only 2.5 billion. That was also the year that the online gambling market was liberalized and the online gambling and lottery world opened for a large group of young people and others without gambling experience.

Gambling

The companies did not harm that. But in the meantime the number of gambling addicts in addiction care, according to figures From the Information provision for Care Foundation, in recent years.

As of July 1, it is therefore forbidden for online gambling companies to sponsor football clubs. Television programs, (sports) events, radio and public places such as Billboards should not be used for expressions of online gambling providers.

Wesley Sneijder as toto-mascot ‘Koning Toto’ disappeared from the commercials before. In 2022, the House of Representatives, shocked by the large rise in the number of gambling young people in recent years, determined that well -known Dutch people were no longer allowed to figure in gambling advertisements.

Despite the many measures to reduce the public presence of the gambling industry, the KNVB announced on Tuesday that Lottotrekking Eurojackpot will be the main sponsor of three important competitions in the coming five years.

‘Low risk’

The KNVB can go into the sea with Eurojackpot, says a spokesperson for the Gaming Authority, the Dutch regulator for gambling games. The company is a lottery and is therefore one of the gambling companies category with a so -called ‘low risk profile’. At lotteries it is possible to buy lottery tickets, and it takes a relatively long time for players to know if they have won a prize.

Nevertheless, football fans on social media call the choice « hypocritical » and they wonder what example the KNVB gives with this. « It is a political choice, » said the Gaming Authority spokesperson. « The prohibition on sports sponsorship does not apply to lotteries. So then we already foreseen that they might fill the gap that online gambling companies leave behind. »

It is not possible for gambling companies, as happens in Belgium, to set up so -called sports news sites and advertise for games of chance. For example, those kinds of websites contain previews at competitions, with links to the gambling providers in the text. In the Netherlands, the Gaming Authority has discussions with sports associations and gambling providers to prevent these types of constructions in any case.

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