Anyone who’s watched the BBC’s Twenty Twenty Six will recognise the tone. Beneath the satire, it captures something very real – the internal tension that builds around an event of this scale. Competing priorities, competing narratives and a constant push to land in the right place commercially without ending up on the wrong side of public or regulatory perception. I’ve sat in enough of those rooms to know it’s not far off. And with this summer’s tournament across North America, those conversations aren’t hypothetical. They’re happening now – across operators, rights holders and partners all trying to position themselves for what is, commercially, one of the biggest moments in the cycle. More inventory. More eyeballs. More pressure to deliver return. But also: more scrutiny.

That tension is particularly sharp for gambling brands. For European and Asian audiences especially, this is a World Cup played at unusual hours. Late nights, early mornings, fragmented viewing patterns. From a pure opportunity standpoint, that opens up more space – more breaks, more touchpoints, more chances to stay visible around in-play betting behaviour. But the context matters. Those same conditions – the time of day, the immediacy of in-play markets, the accessibility – are the exact environment where risk escalates. That’s not theoretical. It’s lived.