There are YouTube events, and then there is the Sidemen Charity Match. What started as a modest football kickabout between British creators back in 2016 has grown into one of the most anticipated sporting spectacles on the internet calendar, and the seventh edition lands today, Saturday 18 April 2026, at Wembley Stadium in London.
What Is the Sidemen Charity Match?
For anyone who needs a quick catch-up, the Sidemen are a British YouTube supergroup made up of seven creators: KSI, Miniminter, Zerkaa, TBJZL, Behzinga, Vikkstar123, and W2S. Since 2016, they have organised a recurring charity football match pitting their team, Sidemen FC, against a rotating squad of YouTube stars and influencers known as the YouTube Allstars.
Every edition has been livestreamed on YouTube, raising money for various British charities. The concept is simple enough, but the execution has scaled in a way that nobody could have predicted when 15,000 fans turned up to St Mary’s Stadium in Southampton a decade ago.
The inaugural match took place on 3 June 2016 at St Mary’s Stadium, where Sidemen FC beat the YouTube Allstars 7–2. Around 600,000 people watched it live on YouTube, which was a record for the platform at the time. From those beginnings, the event bounced between The Valley in Charlton and the London Stadium before finally landing at Wembley.
The fourth edition, held in 2022, earned a Guinness World Record as the most viewed charity sports match livestream on YouTube, peaking at over 2.5 million concurrent viewers. That match also crossed the £1 million fundraising mark for the first time, making it clear that something genuinely significant was happening here.
The 2025 Match
If 2022 was the breakthrough, then 2025 was the confirmation. The sixth edition, held on 8 March 2025 at Wembley Stadium, attracted over 90,000 spectators and drew more than 2.7 million concurrent viewers online, making it the largest football match hosted by content creators in that year.
The match ended in a chaotic 9–9 draw, with the YouTube Allstars eventually winning on a penalty shootout 5–4. The halftime show featured rapper AJ Tracey, with KSI also performing his track “Thick of It.”
The real headline, though, was the money raised. The 2025 match raised over £4.7 million, shared between BBC’s Children in Need (50%), the Sidemen’s own Bright Side charity (43%), and M7 Education (7%). That single-day figure nearly doubled the previous record of £2.4 million set in 2023, and it pushed the event’s overall lifetime total past a remarkable milestone. As of 2025, the Sidemen Charity Match has raised over £8.5 million for various British charities across all six editions.
IShowSpeed finally got his long-awaited goal, too. The American streamer, who had been a fan favourite at the event for years, buried the winning penalty in the shootout to give the YouTube Allstars the victory. If you know anything about Speed’s relationship with the Sidemen events, you will understand why that moment brought the house down.
Sidemen FC was captained by Miniminter and featured the core Sidemen squad of KSI, Zerkaa, TBJZL, Behzinga, Vikkstar123, and W2S, with substitutes including LazarBeam, Jme, Callux, and JasonTheWeen among others. The YouTube Allstars were captained by IShowSpeed, with xQc in goal, and the squad notably featured Mark Rober, Logan Paul, CarryMinati, Jynxzi, Max Fosh, and Theo Baker, who ended up as the standout player of the match with a hat-trick. The final score was 9–9 after full time, with the YouTube Allstars winning 5–4 on penalties, IShowSpeed scoring the decisive spot kick.
The 2026 Match
The seventh edition, happening today, comes with a twist that fans have been buzzing about since the announcement in December 2025. For the first time in the event’s history, the Sidemen themselves are not all on the same team. KSI, Miniminter, and Behzinga will represent the YouTube Allstars, while Vikkstar123, TBJZL, W2S, and Zerkaa will line up for Sidemen FC.
That is genuinely compelling. Watching friends and longtime collaborators compete against each other adds a layer of drama that no amount of viral moments can manufacture. The 2026 match marks the 10-year anniversary of the original fixture, and tickets sold out even faster than in 2025, going in under two hours.
The game kicks off at 3:00 PM BST, with doors opening for general admission at 1:00 PM and hospitality guests from midday. The fan zone outside Wembley opens earlier, giving supporters time to enjoy the pre-match atmosphere.
The current predicted lineup for Sidemen FC includes xQc, Lazarbeam, Wroetoshaw, Zerkaa, Deji, ChrisMD, Vikkstar123, and Jynxzi, while the YouTube Allstars are expected to feature Sketch, WillNE, CarryMinati, Mrwhosetheboss, Max Fosh, Behzinga, KSI, Ibai, StableRonaldo, and Miniminter.
Proceeds from this edition will support Bright Side and M7 Education, the two charities that have become closely associated with the event in recent years.
This is where things get interesting because of the team split. The confirmed lineups per FotMob are as follows. Sidemen FC lines up with xQc in goal, and outfield players including W2S (Wroetoshaw), Zerkaa, TBJZL, Vikkstar123, Deji, LazarBeam, ChrisMD, AmineMaTue, Marlon Lundgren Garcia, and Niko. The YouTube Allstars, meanwhile, feature Sketch in goal, with KSI, Miniminter, and Behzinga all switching sides, joined by Mrwhosetheboss, StableRonaldo, Ibai, CarryMinati, Danny Aarons, JasonTheWeen, and AngryGinge13. It is also worth noting that WillNE and Max Fosh were late replacements after El Rubius and Fanum pulled out for undisclosed reasons. The team managers are Jack Joseph for Sidemen FC and Calfreezy for the YouTube Allstars.
How to Watch
As with every previous edition, the match will be livestreamed on the official Sidemen YouTube channel. If you are not one of the 90,000 in the stadium, YouTube is where the action will be. Given the numbers from 2025, viewership records could be under serious pressure today.
It is easy to dismiss creator-led events as novelty, but the Sidemen Charity Match has earned the right to be taken seriously. Three of the five most-viewed football games ever streamed by content creators are Sidemen events, and the 2025 edition placed alongside the world’s top single-day charity sports events in terms of money raised.
The formula works because it respects both the entertainment value and the charitable purpose. As the Sidemen’s management put it, a great show produces great fundraising, so both have to be a priority. The viral moments, the rivalries, the cameos from global stars and the halftime performances are all in service of something bigger.
