Mansion Casino now Manchester City official betting partner

Manchester City FC announced Tuesday on their website that the Mansion Group, operators of Mansion online casino, are now their international betting partners.

The deal is said to be worth somewhere in the vicinity of £2 million to £3 million annually and according to a club news release will see, “Mansion Group and the Club collaborate across a wide range of commercial activities, including the extension and expansion of the Manchester City brand into key territories across Asia and other special commercial projects of mutual interest and benefit to both parties.”

The exact nature of the brand exposure Mansion will be getting for their cash investment wasn’t really made very clear but CEO Guy Gussarsky seemed happy with the deal saying, “Our love of the English Premier League means that we are very excited to be partnering with Manchester City as their International Betting Partner for the next two seasons.”

I guess a few thousand websites are reporting the news so there’s a start!

From Strength to Strength

For Manchester City, this sponsorship is the latest in a flood of deals that have seen it’s bank account continue to swell. Just last month they sold the naming rights to City of Manchester Stadium to Etihad in a 10 year deal rumored to be worth around UK£150 million, extended their Etihad shirt sponsorship deal and also managed to partner with video gaming company EA Sports. There have also been deals with Heineken, Jaguar and a strong contingent of other Middle Eastern organizations including Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority, Etisalat and Aabar.

According to Deloittes they’re the fastest climbers in the Football Money League, an analysis of the richest clubs in Europe, coming in at number 11…with a bullet.

 

Of course being owned by a multi-billionaire with significant interests in Abu Dhabi’s oil industry never hurts the bank balance.

Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan is rumoured to have Barack Obama’s personal phone number on speed dial so he probably doesn’t have too many problems getting the ball rolling with the odd commercial endorsement deal.  He also happens to own a big chunk of some of the companies that sponsor his football club (not Mansion…I think).

Since buying the club in 2008 Sheik Mansour has gone on an Abramovich style spending spree, immediately signing Brazilian international Robinho from Real Madrid for £32.5 million. In the summer of 2009 Manchester City topped the Premier League net transfer spend list by a long way, forking out almost €120 million on names like Gareth Barry, Carlos Tevez, Roque Santa Cruz, Emmanuel Adebayor, Kolo Toure, and Joleon Lescott. All money well spent I’m sure fans will agree because (as well as not being there’s) it has already helped their club win the 2o11 FA Cup.

Mansion have without doubt hitched themselves to a European football powerhouse.

A little about Mansion Casino

We don’t have a review up for these guys but in a nutshell, they’re a large, well established operator who have been around since 2004 and are licensed/based in Gibraltar.  Their live dealer games are powered by Playtech.

A little trivia

The largest ever crowd at an EPL club ground was 84,569 for the FA Cup tie between Manchester City and  Stoke City on 3 March 1934. Manchester City beat Stoke City 1-0 to win the 2011 FA Cup final. Stoke City’s official betting partner is Mansion’s online gambling competitor bet365.