Play the Game Podcast

A podcast about the people, powers, and politics shaping sport. Play the Game Podcast will bring you some of the voices, stories, and debates that rarely get enough space in the world of sport. For almost three decades, Play the Game has worked to create space for open, critical, and informed dialogue about international sport. We have done so through our conferences, analyses, and journalism. Now, we are bringing that work to your headphones. You will hear from investigative journalists, researchers, athletes, whistleblowers, sports leaders, decision-makers, and other voices who help uncover what is happening behind the scenes of international sport. We will bring you interviews, narrated articles, conference presentations, and critical debates on some of the biggest challenges facing sport today — from corruption, matchfixing, doping, and human rights to geopolitics, gambling, sustainability, athlete welfare, and abuse in sport. Some episodes will give new life to important material from Play the Game’s conferences and website — presentations, articles, and conversations that deserve to travel further than the room where they were first heard. For many years, Play the Game has been known as a home for the homeless questions in sport. Today, there are still many such questions — and many people who need a place where difficult, uncomfortable, and important stories can be told. The Play the Game Podcast is for everyone who believes that sport deserves scrutiny, transparency, and open debate.

Play the Game Podcast is a society podcast hosted by Unknown Host, with 0 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Unknown Host hosts Play the Game Podcast, a society show with 0 episodes published.

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  Play the Game Podcast

  FIFA’s latest crisis shows why sport needs independent oversight

  Aug 18, 202610 min

  FIFA’s latest crisis has once again raised a fundamental question for international sport: Who holds those in power to account when sport’s own systems fail? In this episode of the Play the Game Podcast, you can hear a narrated version of the opinion piece “FIFA’s latest crisis shows why sport needs independent oversight”, written by Stanis Elsborg, head of Play the Game, and Jens Sejer Andersen, founder and senior advisor. The piece responds to the recent crisis around Gianni Infantino’s plan to restructure FIFA’s commercial operations — a proposal that triggered protest, pressure, and internal criticism before it was withdrawn. But the argument goes beyond FIFA and Infantino. The episode looks at a recurring pattern in international sport: when sport’s own safeguards fail, it is often journalists, whistleblowers, survivors, lawyers, prosecutors, and public authorities who expose what the system did not confront. From corruption and doping scandals to abuse, match manipulation, and other integrity breaches, Play the Game argues that internal reform is no longer enough. The episode presents the case for permanent and genuinely independent oversight in international sport — and introduces ClearingSport, Play the Game’s proposal for an independent international entity able to counter crime, corruption, and other integrity breaches in sport. Host and narrator: Stanis Elsborg, head of Play the Game Authors: Stanis Elsborg and Jens Sejer Andersen This episode is produced by Play the Game. Music: Voices by rexlambo & I Walk With Ghosts by Scott Buckley

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  Play the Game Podcast

  Lindsey Kennedy: Scams, slavery and surface-to-air missiles – Online sports betting in Southeast Asia

  Jul 15, 202611 min

  Online sports betting is often presented as entertainment – a fast-growing industry built around odds, apps, sponsorships, and fan engagement. But behind parts of that industry lies a much darker story. In this episode, you can hear investigative journalist Lindsey Kennedy expose how illegal online gambling networks in Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos, and the Philippines have developed into sprawling criminal empires built on human trafficking, forced labour, torture, corruption, and organised crime. Thousands of people from around the world are lured by fake job offers and end up trapped in compounds where online gambling and scam operations thrive. As these compounds expand, they have even become entangled in armed conflict – turning parts of the global betting industry into something far more dangerous than a question of gambling regulation. The episode also connects the story to international sport. According to Kennedy, companies linked to these criminal networks have been able to sponsor major European football clubs, using sport to clean their image, build legitimacy, and move closer to the mainstream. Host: Stanis Elsborg, head of Play the Game Speaker: Lindsey Kennedy, investigative journalist and research director at the Eyewitness Project This episode is produced by Play the Game. Music: Voices by rexlambo

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  Play the Game Podcast

  Stanis Elsborg on Infantino’s FIFA: Ten years of power, politics, and so-called ethics

  Jul 1, 202646 min

  Ten years ago, Gianni Infantino was elected FIFA president with a promise of reform, transparency, accountability, and a “new FIFA”. At the time, world football was still shaking from one of the biggest corruption scandals in sports history. Senior FIFA officials had been arrested, investigators were uncovering bribery and money laundering schemes, and journalists and whistleblowers had exposed a system built on loyalty, money, and power. In this episode of the Play the Game Podcast, Stanis Elsborg looks back at Gianni Infantino’s first decade as FIFA president and asks a simple question: What kind of FIFA did he actually build? The episode traces FIFA’s journey from the corruption scandal of 2015 into the Infantino era - looking at reform promises, politics, weakened independent scrutiny, and FIFA’s growing proximity to political power. It also explores Infantino’s relationships with Vladimir Putin, Qatar’s leadership, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Donald Trump - and asks what these relationships reveal about FIFA’s direction under his presidency. Along the way, the episode revisits the role of investigative journalists, whistleblowers, and reform figures who challenged FIFA’s culture of impunity, including Andrew Jennings. Host: Stanis Elsborg, head of Play the Game This episode is produced by Play the Game. Music: I Walk With Ghosts by Scott Buckley & Cold Case by Riverside

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  Play the Game Podcast

  Interview: Karim Zidan on how sport became part of Donald Trump’s MAGA machine

  Jun 23, 20261h 11m

  In this episode of the Play the Game Podcast, Stanis Elsborg speaks with investigative journalist Karim Zidan about Donald Trump’s long and increasingly political relationship with sport. For decades, Trump has used boxing, professional wrestling, golf, mixed martial arts, and football to build his brand, cultivate power, and place himself at the centre of the spectacle. Since returning to the White House in January 2025, Trump has attended major sporting events, signed executive orders on sport, created White House task forces for the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, and surrounded himself with a network of sports executives, athletes, influencers, and political operators. Karim Zidan explains how sport has become part of Trump’s political infrastructure - a space where strength, masculinity, nationalism, loyalty, grievance, and entertainment are turned into political power. The conversation looks at Trump’s relationship with combat sports, from boxing and professional wrestling to the UFC; the role of figures such as Dana White, Joe Rogan, Casey Wasserman, and others. Karim Zidan is an investigative journalist who writes about the intersection of sport, politics, power, authoritarianism, and human rights. He is also the author of the forthcoming book The Ultimate Strongmen , which examines how mixed martial arts has become a powerful tool for political agendas, propaganda, and control. Host: Stanis Elsborg, head of Play the Game Guest: Karim Zidan, investigative journalist and author This episode is produced by Play the Game. Music: Lost in the ocean by limujii & Cold Case by Riverside

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  Play the Game Podcast

  Across Mexico, World Cup 2026 projects are putting communities and ecosystems under pressure

  Jun 16, 202627 min

  This story is written by Monika Streule for Play the Game and narrated by Stanis Elsborg. In this episode, urban anthropologist Monika Streule takes us to Mexico City, Monterrey, and Guadalajara, where 2026 World Cup-related projects, infrastructure upgrades, and urban development are colliding with local struggles over water, land, housing, public space, and environmental protection. In Mexico City, residents near the Azteca Stadium continue to resist projects they fear will increase water scarcity, displacement, and gentrification. In Monterrey, the build-up to the World Cup has intersected with long-running conflicts over public land, air pollution, water access, and the protection of rivers. And in Guadalajara, the Akron Stadium and its surroundings near La Primavera forest raise questions about urban expansion, wildfire risks, pressure on water resources, and the limits of sustainability branding. The episode looks beyond the global spectacle and asks what happens locally when the world’s biggest football tournament arrives. Host: Stanis Elsborg, head of Play the Game Author: Monika Streule, urban anthropologist and professor of social anthropology based in Mexico City This episode is produced by Play the Game. Music: Cold Case by Riverside

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