Villa gets into bed with not one but two bookies...

Aston Villa is delighted to announce two new club partners and confusingly, there are both bookmakers.


Betfair and bet365 become official partners of the club from tomorrow s will share co-exclusive rights in the betting category.

Both will have the right to be associated with Aston Villa and "activate the partnerships globally"  whatever that means and both will appear on the club's tellies and interview backdrops.

Aston Villa chief commercial officer, Charlie Wijeratna (try pronouncing that after a few San Miguels), commented: "I am very pleased that we have got two top betting brands on board as partners for next season.

"Commercially the club has two aims - we want to partner with good brands that will activate extensively and we want to increase our commercial revenues so we can compete with the best on the pitch.

"These two deals represent a very significant commercial increase on last year's betting partnership and taken together with the recent announcement of an enhanced shirt sponsorship deal with a top US brand, demonstrate significant progress towards those goals."