Advertising prohibition was taken to a new level in August. Valencia were forced to wear plain white shirts when playing Stabaek in Oslo, having to drop their sponsor's name - Unibet.com - for the game due to Norway's highly selective ban on advertising online gambling.


This is nothing new, with sponsors having been taken off shirts countless times in the past to comply with local laws.  The difference here, however, is that whilst the Norweigans are denying Unibet the right to advertise their services, they are only too happy to advertise state-owned Norsk Tipping and Rikstoto.


Further, the club was given little warning of the decision, instead only finding out in the hours leading up to the game.

Unibet is now considering launching a complaint, especially given that only a few weeks prior to Valencia's game, a Polish team was permitted to display BetClic on their shirts.

It seems that consistency and equality of law enforcement are not the chief concern of the Norwegian government. Norway are not the only country guilty of such discrimination, with French authorities banning BetClic from being displayed on shirts in domestic league games.