March 13, 2026
Part of our series on ASA rulings relating to children’s appeal in gambling marketing
In contrast to the rulings discussed above, the ASA assessed a complaint against Match Bingo in November 2025, which was not upheld. Following Independent Review, the ruling was republished in March 2026, although the decision not to uphold the complaint remained.
An ad for Match Bingo appeared on the YouTube channel of 442oons in May 2025, either side of editorial content. The editorial content included an animation featuring Tottenham Hotspur and other football-related figures singing a song, while the ad itself included an animated presenter.
Match Bingo maintained that they had strict age-verification measures in place which prevented under-18s from accessing their products and had obtained demographic information ahead of placing the ad showing that over 91% of the channel audience was over 18. Additionally, all content on the 442oons channel was explicitly marked as ‘not made for kids’, in order to direct the YouTube algorithm away from children. The ad included a play on the song “Glory Glory Tottenham Hotspur”, with the animated presenter substituting the words for “Glory Glory Match Bingo”. Match Bingo maintained that the content was created with an adult audience in mind, and that the song used was a version recorded in 1981, which therefore appealed strongly to an older demographic. Seemingly, the ASA did not assess the ad for strong appeal, focusing instead on whether it was targeted appropriately, which would require the ad to not appear in media where the under-18 audience was above 25% across both the video and the YouTube channel itself.
The ASA did not uphold the complaint, agreeing that the audience demographic and the marking of the video as ‘not made for kids’ limited the number of under-18s who would see the video. This would mean the ads would only be targeted alongside adult-orientated content and channels and not breach the requirement that gambling ads should not appear in areas where 25% of the audience is below 18. Regarding the animation aspect, ASA considered that the styling of the figures was realistic rather than exaggerated, which distanced it from youth-orientated content, and moreover, the content was satirical and was not focused on football gameplay.
It is important to note that the animated editorial content was not assessed for strong appeal, but rather it was assessed as to whether the Match Bingo ad was targeted alongside content which may significantly increase the likelihood of under-18s seeing the ad. Therefore, this ruling cannot be seen as saying this type of animation or style using Premier League football players would not be classed as strong appeal to under-18s if it were to be used in a gambling ad. The ad was considered not to breach rules 16.1 or 16.3.13 of the CAP Code which is a specific review on how the ad was targeted.
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