SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
The UK Advertising Standard Authority (ASA) has reprimanded Ladbrokes for causing offence by displaying an advert for betting exchange subsidiary Betdaq in which Rio de Janeiro’s Christ the Redeemer statue is wearing a Betdaq purple and white football shirt.
The advert which ran during this summer’s FIFA World Cup in Brazil, was displayed on the Betdaq.com website, and featured the promotional text “World Cup 2014 – Bet With Betdaq”
ASA deemed the advert to be inappropriate, and that the context could cause offence to religious groups. ASA noted that the Christ the Redeemer statue would be landmark for the World Cup, and would be used by various advertisers targeting customers during the event.
Ladbrokes and Betdaq marketing have been told that the image must not be used again.
The operator issued the following statement regarding the image “Betdaq ran this as a tongue in cheek ad focusing on Christ the redeemer as synonymous with Rio and the World Cup. On receiving complaints that associating the image with gambling was upsetting to Christians we removed the image and have ceased using the advert. In short, ahead of this decision we had already responded to feedback and we apologise to anyone who felt offended.”
