Tackling dirty money in football
Think tank: RUSI
Author(s): Kathryn Westmore; Georgia Jones
December 12, 2025
This report from UK think tank states that reform and proportionate regulation are now essential to stem the tide of dirty money in football.
This report says that the game’s governance, financial structures and cross-border transactions have created systemic vulnerabilities readily exploited by criminals, and outlines how clubs, intermediaries and players become entangled in illicit finance.
It provides high-profile examples of politically exposed club owners, multi-million-pound fraud schemes, opaque offshore structures and match-fixing orchestrated by organised crime groups.
The report concludes that reform and proportionate regulation are now essential to stem the tide of dirty money undermining the integrity of the game.
