Casino Guru has started its final evaluation phase for the Casino Guru Awards 2026, with winners set to be announced on May 25 at Xara Lodge in Malta, ahead of the NEXT Valletta conference.

The company said nominations have closed and shortlists are finalized, with the Casino Guru team now reviewing shortlisted nominees’ track records through judge discussions and meetings with candidates. Winners are selected using what Casino Guru describes as a mix of data-led evaluation and expert assessment, drawing on its Safety Index and Complaint Resolution Center.

Public voting remains open for the Player’s Choice and Voice of the People categories, giving players and industry stakeholders a direct vote alongside the judging process.

“The Casino Guru Awards are not about who is the biggest or most visible,” said Daniela Sliva, PR & Creative Projects Director from Casino Guru. “They are about who is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.”

Casino Guru expects around 150 guests at the Malta event, which it positioned as an industry networking evening alongside the awards announcements.

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Immense Group’s online casino brand Mega Riches has provided a series of matchday hospitality packages at The Hawthorns for supporters connected to The Albion Foundation, the official charity partner of West Bromwich Albion.

The initiative ran across multiple fixtures this season, with beneficiaries hosted in the Richardson Suite. The club’s back-of-shirt sponsor said the packages went to Foundation volunteers, charity fundraisers and community lottery winners.

The press release highlights recipients including a long-serving Foundation volunteer celebrating her 70th birthday, and a supporter whose attendance at Foundation Day helped raise £1,127 for the Cancer Kickers programme. Winners from the Foundation’s Baggies Bonanza and darts evening fundraisers were also included.

One winner, Albion fan Ellie, attended the Albion vs Millwall match as Mega Riches’ guest after winning a bonus prize at the Hull City Foundation Day fixture in March. She said: “Our time in The Richardson Suite was fab. The staff and service were impeccable.

“We thoroughly enjoyed the food and complimentary drinks, as well as the Q&A session with the WBA legends. I would really recommend anyone wanting a more VIP experience at Albion to give it a try.”

Immense Group CMO Marco Trucco said: “Football reaches into communities in a way very few things do. When we looked at how we wanted to build our relationship with West Bromwich Albion, brand visibility was never going to be enough on its own.

“The work the Albion Foundation does, for cancer patients, for volunteers, for people who might otherwise be isolated, that’s the kind of purpose we want our brands to support. Mega Riches made that happen this season. Immense Group intends to keep making it happen.”

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By David Nilsen, Editor-in-Chief, Kongebonus

European football rarely stays confined within national borders. Teams compete internationally, brands operate globally and sponsorship deals are designed for audiences far beyond a single market. Yet gambling regulation remains firmly national. When these two realities meet, tensions are almost inevitable.

That tension was visible during the UEFA Champions League fixture between Inter Milan and Bodø/Glimt at the Aspmyra Stadion in February, when the Italian club took to the pitch wearing Betsson.sport on its shirts. The Norwegian Gambling Authority later confirmed it had opened a case following the match, after concerns were raised that the branding could violate Norway’s strict marketing rules.

At first glance, the situation appears straightforward. Norway prohibits gambling marketing from any operator other than the state-owned Norsk Tipping and Norsk Rikstoto. Under this framework, foreign operators are not allowed to advertise or actively target Norwegian players. However, the details of this particular case are more complex.

The logo that appeared on Inter’s shirt was not a betting website, but Betsson.sport, a sports-focused platform linked to the company’s sponsorship activity in Italy. The site itself does not offer deposits or betting functionality. Instead, it operates as a sports content and partnership platform connected to the club’s commercial agreements.

This distinction matters because the regulatory context in Italy is very different from Norway’s. In 2018, Italy introduced the Decreto Dignità, one of Europe’s strictest gambling advertising bans. The legislation effectively eliminated traditional betting sponsorships across media and sport, even for licensed operators.

As a result, many brands have had to rethink how they maintain visibility in sports environments. Alternative branding, content platforms and sports-focused domains have become one of the few remaining routes available in a market where direct betting advertising is largely prohibited.

Seen through that lens, Betsson.sport is less an attempt to bypass regulation and more an example of how companies adapt to it.

When Inter Milan travelled to northern Norway, however, that Italian solution entered a completely different regulatory environment. Norway’s restrictions are not based on a broad ban on gambling advertising. Instead, they are built around the protection of a state monopoly. Only two operators are permitted to market gambling services domestically, and enforcement tools such as payment blocking and website restrictions are used to limit access to foreign operators.

The key question raised by the Inter match therefore becomes one of interpretation rather than simple legality. Does the presence of a brand associated with gambling, even when it links to a non-betting platform, constitute marketing towards Norwegian consumers?

It is a question regulators across Europe are likely to face more often as global sport continues to expand and sponsorship models become more complex.

Another factor worth noting is accessibility. Betsson does not currently operate in Norway, and access to its gambling platforms has been blocked for Norwegian users. This raises the issue of whether brand visibility alone, without a functional gambling product available to local players, should be considered the same as active marketing.

From a regulatory perspective, authorities may still decide that the brand association itself falls under advertising restrictions. That interpretation would be consistent with Norway’s broader efforts to protect the monopoly model and prevent indirect promotion of unlicensed operators.

At the same time, cases like this highlight the practical challenges regulators face when global sports competitions cross with national advertising rules. European tournaments bring together teams, sponsors and audiences from multiple jurisdictions, each operating under different regulatory philosophies.

Italy, for example, has taken a sweeping approach by banning gambling advertising across the board. Norway, meanwhile, has focused on maintaining exclusive rights for state operators while limiting the presence of international competitors.

Both systems are strict in their own way, but they are built on different principles.

When a club like Inter Milan competes internationally, the sponsorship arrangements negotiated within one regulatory system inevitably travel into another. This creates situations where branding designed to comply with one set of rules may still raise questions under another.

For players and fans, these nuances are rarely visible. What they see is simply a football shirt and a brand name. But for regulators, operators and industry observers, the case illustrates how complex the global gambling landscape has become.

None of this changes the underlying reality that gambling advertising remains one of the most tightly controlled areas of the digital economy. Governments are increasingly focused on consumer protection, and enforcement tools are becoming more sophisticated each year.

But as the Inter–Betsson example demonstrates, the real challenge lies not only in writing regulations but in applying them consistently in a world where sport, media and digital platforms operate across borders.

For the industry, it is another reminder that regulatory debates are rarely black and white. In many cases, they sit somewhere in between legal interpretation, practical enforcement and the global nature of modern sport.

The case opened by the Norwegian Gambling Authority and its conclusions may help clarify how situations like this should be interpreted going forward.

But as long as football continues to be played across borders, questions like these are unlikely to disappear any time soon.

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