Football AI video: how clubs, leagues and media tell the game

Football AI video has moved past the test phase. In August 2026 Manchester City unveiled a third kit designed by a supporter using generative AI, leagues are publishing highlights and live commentary produced in seconds, and players are lobbying for laws to protect their faces. Here is what clubs, leagues and media are actually doing, with examples verified from 2024 to today.

Then the practical part: image rights, how supporters react, and a playbook of formats to make and mistakes to avoid, from a studio that makes AI video for football.

Clubs and brands: kit launches and campaigns

The biggest case of 2026 belongs to Manchester City. In December 2024 the club and PUMA opened AI Creator, a tool that turns a written prompt into a kit design. It drew 180,000 entries, fans voted on a shortlist of ten, and a design by a supporter called Elliott became the 2026/27 third kit, unveiled on 27 August 2026.

“AI can enhance the speed in the process, but the vision and final decisions will remain human-led.” Alonso Sanchez, PUMA, speaking to Dezeen

The risk was already visible in May 2024, when Paris Saint-Germain launched its 2024-25 home kit with AI-generated photos of the players. An adidas logo appeared on Lucas Hernandez’s ball, in a Nike campaign, as La Réclame pointed out.

Leagues and broadcasters: speed, scale, languages

Automated highlights and commentary

Lega Serie A announced a three-year deal with WSC Sports in May 2022 for real-time automated highlights of the league, the Supercoppa and the Coppa Italia. LaLiga uses the same technology to crop broadcast footage from 16:9 to 9:16, following the ball, and serve vertical highlights in its app (2024 Hashtag Sports Awards).

The Bundesliga, with AWS as official generative AI provider since March 2024, has built a live ticker written from match data: according to the AWS blog, each entry appears 7–12 seconds after the action, in several languages and voices, from sports journalist to Gen Z.

The Premier League signed a five-year deal with Microsoft in July 2025: a Copilot-powered Companion drawing on 30 seasons of stats, 300,000 articles and 9,000 videos. UEFA picked Alibaba as its exclusive AI partner from 2027/28 (SVG Europe, June 2026), and FIFA and Lenovo announced 3D player avatars to show offside calls in the 2026 World Cup host broadcast (FIFA).

Voice and languages

Ligue 1 signed with CAMB.AI in March 2025 to take commentary and interviews into other languages through AI translation and voice. At Paris 2024 Peacock offered personalised Olympic recaps narrated by an AI recreation of Al Michaels’s voice, with close to 7 million estimated variants (NBC News).

Where it goes wrong

Speed without oversight has a cost. In September 2024 ESPN’s AI-generated recap of Alex Morgan’s final professional match did not mention Alex Morgan, despite a promise that a human editor would review every recap. The fix arrived the next morning (Awful Announcing).

Image rights: a face is not a free asset

This is where a club can really get hurt. In Italy, Article 96 of the copyright law says a person’s portrait cannot be displayed, reproduced or sold without their consent. Article 97 allows exceptions, such as fame, but still bans any use that harms a person’s honour, reputation or dignity.

On commercial use, Italian case law has been clear for decades: in 1979, in the Mazzola case, the Court of Cassation recognised a footballer’s right to payment for the unauthorised commercial use of his portrait. And likeness is not only the face. A shirt number, a nickname or a signature gesture can be enough if they make the person recognisable, as EC News set out in May 2026.

AI raises the stakes. Italy’s Law 132/2025, in force since 10 October 2025, added Article 612-quater to the criminal code: anyone who causes unjust harm by spreading, without consent, images, video or voices falsified with AI and capable of deceiving faces one to five years in prison (Diritto.it). Across the EU, Article 50 of the AI Act has applied since 2 August 2026: whoever publishes a deepfake must disclose it, with a lighter regime for evidently artistic, creative, satirical or fictional works (McCann FitzGerald).

Players are organising. In September 2026 FIFPRO and the PFA backed “My Name, My Face”, a campaign by law firm Mills & Reeve calling for a UK personality right against deepfakes, fronted by Cole Palmer, Lucy Bronze and Kyle Walker among others. “Everyone should have the right to decide how their identity is used,” said PFA chief executive Maheta Molango.

This is general information, not legal advice: a campaign featuring real players needs advice on the specific case.

What supporters think

Audiences are not rejecting AI as such. In Capgemini's July 2025 report, covering more than 12,000 fans in 11 countries, 59% said they trust AI-generated content. Yet more than half worry that too much technology will drain the authenticity out of sport.

In June 2026 Morecambe launched its 2026-27 kits with AI images: a distorted collar, an off-centre badge, a flood of negative replies and, the next day, standard CAD drawings instead (Footy Headlines). In July Racing de Ferrol publicly apologised for the AI video behind its season-ticket campaign (El Español).

The lesson: supporters accept AI when it lets them take part, as in Manchester, and punish it when it looks like cost-cutting at the club they love. And on the shirt itself, near enough is never good enough.

Football AI video: a playbook for clubs and media

Formats that work

• Kit launch teasers. AI builds the world, the shirt stays exact: start from real photos, CAD files or samples, and check every badge. For London Albion City FC we told the story of London, with brick walls, the Underground and fog on the Thames, and had the new kit rise out of the clouds (it’s in our Work).
• Player-free storytelling. The city, the fans, the ground, the club’s history: where AI has the most freedom and the least rights exposure, as long as no number, nickname or gesture points to a recognisable player.
• Matchday graphics and reels. Speed is prepared in advance: look and templates are signed off before the season, and on matchday you update the score and the scorers.
• Editorial reels for media brands and creators. One strong visual idea beats volume. Ronaldo 980 Goals, our 25-second reel for Fabrizio Romano, repeats a single stance across six shirts, and reached 9.1 million views on his Instagram profile.
• Language versions. One master adapted for different markets, the route Ligue 1 and the Bundesliga took.

What to avoid

1. Leaving product details to the AI: logos, sponsors, badges and collars get checked one by one.
2. The faces, voices or recognisable traits of real players in commercial content without written consent that states where and for how long.
3. Realistic content that looks like news: a signing or a quote that never happened. If it is fiction, it has to be obvious.
4. Automated recaps published without an editor who actually reads them.
5. Hiding AI when the result looks real: in the EU, since 2 August 2026, disclosure is a legal duty.

How we work on football

For us a football AI video project starts with direction, not a prompt: brief, concept and storyboard are approved before a single frame is generated, and usage rights, revision rounds and delivery are written into the proposal before work begins. It is the same three-act method we use for a kit launch, a reel for a media brand or an original ad like Portugal vs Spain. To see what we make for clubs, media and creators, start with our sport page.

Frequently asked questions

Can a football club use AI to make videos featuring its own players?

Yes, but it needs the players' consent for that specific use: in Italy a person’s portrait cannot be exploited commercially without permission, and that extends to traits that identify them, such as a shirt number or nickname. The safe route is a written agreement covering channels, duration and formats.

Do you have to disclose that a football video was made with AI?

In the EU, since 2 August 2026, yes if the video is a deepfake, meaning it realistically shows people, places or events and could pass as authentic. For clearly creative or fictional work, a disclosure that doesn’t spoil the viewing is enough.

How long does it take to make an AI video for a football club?

It depends on the format. Automated highlights and copy appear within seconds, while a launch teaser or an ad takes days of concept, generation and editing. For matchday content, sign off the look and templates before the season starts.

Sources

1. "It’s a genuine honour" says fan who designed our 2026/27 PUMA Third kit · Manchester City FC, 2026-08-27
2. Manchester City AI kit by Puma · Dezeen, 2026-09-01
3. La grosse boulette de l’IA du PSG pour ses nouveaux maillots 2024-2025 · La Réclame, 2024-05-13
4. Serie A, accordo con WSC Sports per gli highlights · Calcio e Finanza, 2022-05-10
5. How LALIGA uses AI to create vertical highlights for its app · Hashtag Sports Awards, 2024-06
6. DFL Deutsche Fußball Liga and Amazon Web Services expand partnership to further drive innovation across Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2 · Amazon, 2024-03-20
7. Revolutionizing fan engagement: Bundesliga generative AI-powered live commentary · AWS for M&E Blog, 2024-07-09
8. Premier League and Microsoft announce five-year strategic partnership to personalize the fan experience with AI for 1.8 billion people · Microsoft, 2025-07-01
9. Alibaba Group to deploy advanced AI capabilities as part of partnership with UEFA men’s club competitions and UEFA Euro 2028 · SVG Europe, 2026-06-02
10. FIFA and Lenovo unveil multiple AI-powered innovations ahead of FIFA World Cup 2026 · FIFA, 2026-01-07
11. Ready for kick-off? French football league employs AI commentators · TVBEurope, 2025-03-20
12. NBC to use AI-generated version of Al Michaels' voice during Summer Olympics · NBC News, 2024-06
13. ESPN AI recap of Alex Morgan’s final professional match fails to mention Alex Morgan · Awful Announcing, 2024-09-09
14. Legge sul diritto d’autore, art. 96 · Brocardi.it, 1941-04-22
15. Legge sul diritto d’autore, art. 97 · Brocardi.it, 1941-04-22
16. L’ombra di Sinner e il concetto giuridico di immagine · EC News, 2026-05-20
17. Legge 23 settembre 2025, n. 132 - Disposizioni e deleghe al Governo in materia di intelligenza artificiale · Gazzetta Ufficiale, 2025-09-25
18. La legge n.132/2025 sull’Intelligenza Artificiale: le novità penali · Diritto.it, 2025-09-29
19. Guidelines on transparency of AI-generated content · European Commission, 2026-08-06
20. AI Transparency: European Commission’s Guidelines on Article 50 - Part 2 (Deployer Obligations) · McCann FitzGerald, 2026-08-20
21. Sporting stars back new Mills & Reeve campaign calling for greater legal protections against AI deepfakes · Mills & Reeve, 2026-09-24
22. Beyond the game: The new era of AI-powered sports engagement · Capgemini Research Institute, 2025-07-01
23. Morecambe 26-27 kit launch faces massive backlash over AI-generated ChatGPT image · Footy Headlines, 2026-06-21
24. El Racing de Ferrol pide disculpas por su polémica campaña de abonados: "Lamentamos profundamente el malestar" · El Español, 2026-07-07