Sport sponsorship and sponsorship-linked investment under Saudi Vision 2030: a PRISMA-ScR review of direct and contextual evidence on brand equity, legitimacy, and value co-creation

Introduction: Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030 links sport sponsorship with commercial branding, sport-sector investment, tourism, public policy, and contested legitimacy narratives. This systematic scoping review maps direct evidence on sponsorship outcomes and distinguishes it from broader contextual scholarship. Methods: Following PRISMA-ScR and JBI guidance, an updated OpenAlex search was conducted on 22 August 2026 using 11 title-and-abstract query blocks, supplemented by backward/forward citation checking and targeted searches of official sources. Of 303 records identified (289 database hits and 14 supplementary records), 89 duplicates/duplicate versions were removed, leaving 214 records for screening. Thirty-seven full texts were assessed and 27 reports were included: six direct sponsorship studies and 21 contextual studies or reports. General theory sources were used only for interpretation. Results: Direct evidence, concentrated in football and dominated by cross-sectional, purposive, or qualitative designs, links sponsorship awareness and identification with sponsor image, attitude, purchase intention, and, more recently, stakeholder resistance to sponsor legitimacy. Contextual evidence maps modernization, soft-power, sportswashing, tourism, participation, and governance mechanisms but does not identify sponsorship effects. Study-level appraisal indicates moderate-to-high concern across most direct studies because of non-probability sampling, self-report measurement, narrow settings, or interpretive dependence. Discussion: The synthesis supports an evidence-calibrated framework in which audience processing explains near-term brand outcomes, while governance credibility and stakeholder participation are proposed boundary conditions for legitimacy and public value. These latter pathways, and the proposed measurement dashboard, remain author-derived propositions requiring direct empirical validation.