UK LEGAL
Strong Appeal Q:
What do Gary Neville, Anthony Joshua and the Easter Bunny have in common?
A: They’ve all been banned for use in gambling adverts in the UK, due to being of strong appeal to under 18s.
The ‘strong appeal’ rules by the ASA states that adverts for gambling must not “be of strong appeal to children or young persons, especially by reflecting or being associated with youth culture” (CAP Code 16.3.12 and BCAP Code 17.4.5) and replaced previous wording that adverts must not be of “particular appeal” to under-18s. However, despite three years of rulings by the ASA on this topic, the question of whether an advert is likely to have strong appeal to under 18s remains challenging to predict.
SPORTS PERSONALITIES In some early rulings on this point, the ASA determined that current top level football players were of inherently strong appeal. In late 2022, a complaint about the use of Premier League footballers Philippe Coutinho, Jesse Lingard and Kalidou Koulibaly in an advert for
22 SEPTEMBER 2025
Since the introduction of the ‘strong appeal’ rules by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in October 2022, a series of rulings have clarified which personalities and characters can and cannot appear in gambling adverts. Northridge Law’s Melanie Ellis kicks off this month’s column with with a pub quiz…
Ladbrokes was upheld. This was followed by a ruling against Bet Victor in April 2023, in relation to a Facebook advert featuring FC Barcelona players Jordi Alba and Sergio Busquets, which confirmed that footballers did not need to play in the UK’s Premier League to be of strong appeal to under 18s.
Sports other than football have not escaped the notice of the advertising regulator. In August 2023, Ladbrokes was pulled up again, this time for featuring top tennis players Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Nick Kyrgios and Stefanos Tsitsipas in various tweets. In November that year, a complaint was upheld against Betfred for tweets featuring the boxer Anthony Joshua.
The position is slightly less clear when it comes to retired sports personalities. Peter Crouch was featured in TV ads for Paddy Power in November 2022 leading to two complaints, but the ASA noted that Crouch had not paid professionally since 2019 and did not have active accounts on social media. He had recently appeared on the TV show the Masked Dancer which was popular with children but also had broad appeal, with the ASA ultimately
concluding that the Paddy Power adverts were unlikely to be of strong appeal to under 18s. Former cricketer Stuart Broad was also deeded acceptable for use in a post on X by Fitzdares, likewise retired footballer Micah Richards in a promoted tweet for Sky Bet. However, retired footballer Gary Neville was considered to be of strong appeal to under 18s in another Sky Bet promoted tweet. The total count of under 18s social media followers is a key factor when distinguishing between these retired sportspeople. Gary Neville is notable for having a large following on X and Instagram, with over 7 million followers across those platforms at the date of the ASA ruling in October 2023. 1% of his X followers and 5% of his Instagram followers were under 18, which although a small percentage added up to at least 135,000 under 18 followers in total. In contrast, Micah Richards and Peter Crouch did not have significant presence on social media while Stuart Broad had a total following across the various platforms of over 2 million, but this included only around 7,500 followers who were under 18.
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