English Premier League football clubs Burnley and Leicester City have both secured new partnerships with Ladbrokes.
Leicester’s deal with the bookmaker will run for the duration of the 2017-18 season, which kicked off last weekend.
Ladbrokes will serve as the team’s official UK and Ireland betting partner and also the in-stadia betting provider at the club’s King Power Stadium home.
In addition, the bookmaker will benefit from a presence on LED advertising boards and interview backdrops inside the stadium and offer special odds to Leicester fans that place bets at the ground.
Meanwhile, Burnley and Ladbrokes have agreed a three-year partnership, with the bookmaker to serve as the club’s official UK betting partner from the 2017-18 season until the 2019-20 campaign.
Ladbrokes will provide betting services at the team’s Turf Moor home stadium and also have a branding presence on various surfaces inside the ground, as well as on the club’s official website and social media channels.
The double deal comes despite the English Football Association (FA), the sport’s national governing body, ending its commercial partnership with Ladbrokes in June.
The FA had been under pressure to take action over its gambling partnerships in the wake of a high-profile case involving former Premier League player Joey Barton.
Former England international Barton, who most recently played for Burnley, had been handed a suspension from the professional game after he was found to have placed over 1,200 bets on matches between March 26, 2006, and May 13, 2016, which is in direct conflict with strict FA betting rules.
The FA held a board meeting and concluded that it would end all sponsorships with betting companies, starting from the end of the 2016-17 season.
However, the FA also said it will continue to work with Ladbrokes and various other gambling companies on sharing information on suspicious betting patterns in an effort to clamp down on match-fixing.
