This week the new NFL season kick-off activity begins rolling out, a new basketball league goes from strength to strength while another is causing contention with players, and I wonder how sport is treating the fans that make sport what it is.

WHAT’S SHAPING SPORTS?: THE LEAD

Are working class football fans being discarded by clubs for newer fans attracted to the atmosphere those fans created?

We’re a long way from football grounds being mostly full of fans who grew up in the local area the team resides. As the sport has grown into a monster of a commercial powerhouse screened to every corner of the world, we’re seeing a shift in who clubs want to attract through the turnstiles.

Price increases, reducing concessions for kids & seniors, stricter controls on who season ticket holders can share their seat with when absent and a rise in premium hospitality options all points to maximising as much revenue per seat as possible. Appealing to a class of wealth that can readily afford those prices as well as people making one-off pilgrimages who will spend more on the day are becoming sought after by clubs, which is marginalising people who created the atmosphere and cultural value clubs readily sell to the world.

New research from Democracia84, shows how the cost of football has increased by 47% between 2015-2025 and the gap between what football costs and what fans can afford has widened to 42%.

The Athletic reports that 14 of the 20 EPL clubs have raised the cost of season tickets and some higher than the rate of inflation. 8 clubs are selling some season tickets for over £1,000. They also show while match day revenue is important, it makes up such a small amount of overall revenue.

EPL clubs receive around £90m per season from international and domestic broadcast revenue, before additional money from where they finish and commercial revenue generated from sponsorship, so ticket prices don’t need to rise as much as they do, it’s a choice clubs make. It’s a choice that is hitting working class fans the hardest. The fans who have predominantly been the ones at the heart of a clubs support base and responsible for the atmosphere. An atmosphere that has helped generate those broadcast billions.

The impact of the increase in costs to watch football isn’t just stopping fans from going to games, it has an impact on people’s sense of belonging. Being part of something fuels people across passion and interests, it shapes identity and creates bonding connections. Sport is a great unifier in people’s shared interests and passions but the changes in football over the last decade in price rises and aggressive commercial goals are making it feel unifying at a higher price of entry.

Another impact of this marginalisation is the impact on growing the next generation of the game. If families are priced out, kids don’t get to experience what live attendance does to ones relationship with the game and their team. If costs are stopping older kids and young adults from going, where is the next set of fans coming from? It always amazes me that clubs, leagues and sponsors in football talk about the need to appeal to Gen-Z and now Gen-Alpha and the challenge it is, yet apart from making sweeping generalisations over a generation, seem to ignore the most obvious way to appeal to them is by making access to attendance easier and more affordable.

Football clubs are not like normal businesses or brands. People don’t have the same religious like devotion to a fashion brand or retailer as they do towards a football club. They’re a focal point of a city and town whose success can often be a reflection of those cities and towns and how they’re seen beyond them.

With football looking to generate and squeeze as much revenue as possible out of it, business and brand like language is now common whenever you hear the non-playing side speak. These are commercial powerhouses now capable of generating vast amounts of money, selling the passion and pride of fans across club media, sponsor content and ticket advertising. Add the league’s broadcasters and sponsors into the mix and you have powerful entities selling a culture and atmosphere created by fans, who are increasingly being priced out.

ALSO CATCHING THE EYE…

The habits, rituals and forces that shape the fans experience.

The US Open ticket prices have been dominating conversation as fans share frustration over increasing prices and unaffordable resell tickets. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has announced a plan to offer 1,000 tickets to New York City residents for $100. The Open has become even more popular as tennis grows in cultural popularity, it’s been dubbed the new fashion week and while subsidised tickets help to a degree, the organisers have a challenge to manage the sentiment and goodwill of fans who have shown up year-in-year out and now find themselves on the outside looking in.

The global sports tourism market is expected to grow from $721.6bn in 2026 to nearly $958bn by 2031, as the demand for live events, premium hospitality and sports led destinations grows. It’s not just premium sports events like F1, you can watch a Bundesliga game and have a weekend away in Germany for not much more than a day out at a Premier League game now which makes it an attractive choice. As highlighted in the lead story, the Premier League is looking to tourism as a big revenue stream with people making bucket list trips to their favourite teams. An increase in travel packages and VIP experiences is catering to an audience I’d call “sports experience seekers”.

The trends, opportunities and innovations in how sports are marketed

Callaway has now dropped Good Good Golf as the fallout continues from the pair’s driver ad, which has seen both brands accused of making light of violence against women. “Do not touch my new driver,” Good Good co-founder Garrett Clark said to his colleague Alexis Miestowski, after barging her to the ground. The apology tour has begun and is going as badly as expected. It always makes me wonder how these things get approved. Brands churn out loads of content with their partners these days but an overload of content isn’t an excuse, when multiple stakeholders will be involved in reviewing, providing feedback and approving what goes out.

The Premier League’s popularity in the US is already large and will benefit from the World Cup, so the league staged its first ever Coast to Coast programme on the opening weekend. All 20 clubs hosted their own free fan event across 15 US cities from Arsenal in Denver at McGregor Square, to Sunderland in Nashville at the Fogg Street Lawn Club. The fan events and watch parties took place around each sides opening fixture and were supported by NBC, Peacock and USA Sports.

The US Open is close to doubling it’s credentials for content creators with almost 100 approved as the tournament’s ascent into wider culture continues. A number of them will be working exclusively for the Open itself to bring content from courtside and exclusive areas.

The changes and forces shaping how sports evolve

Unrivaled, the 3-on-3 women’s basketball league, founded by Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart, has raised funds that put its valuation at $650 million. To put the valuation into perspective, it’s higher than all the WNBA teams bar the Golden State Valkyries. Unrivaled was born with a vision to empower athletes as genuine stakeholders whose voices and ownership shape the league’s direction. The value of the player-equity pool will now increase to nearly $200 million after this Series C funding. The third season of the league will again take place in Miami, with an increase in tour stops across the states when it begins in January and will have competition from Project B, a rival format league that will launch that month.

NBA players have an issue with NBA Europe and where the money goes. The new NBA Players Association executive director David Kelly told Front Office Sports, that “It’s clearly being built on the backs of current NBA players, and prior NBA players, on the whole cachet that they brought to this league. And then to start a rival league that they do not participate in, participate in the economics of, we have a very serious problem with that”. Under the current CBA, the NBA does not need to share revenue from the proposed league, but the union has indicated it wants to change that in the next deal. A lot of the conversation around NBA Europe makes it sounds like the league has already been created, but we still seem a long way from that coming to fruition despite the aim of starting in 2027. There are currently no confirmed teams, just news of potential franchise bidders, while the continuing politics between the NBA and EuroLeague need to find common ground.

The PGA Tour has announced a new World Cup style format to close out the competitive season, starting in 2028. The new format was developed by a group led by Tiger Woods and will be the longest format of the game, spread over two weeks and different courses. The top 32 players on the PGA Tour’s season-long points list will be split into eight groups of four, before a knock-out stage to crown the winner.

SPORTS MARKETING WEEKLY SHOWCASE

The NFL is about to return and as part of the new season launch activity we have two films that look on the lighter side of the game. The Season is your Stage from 72andSunny sees a range of NFL players, including Cam Bynum and Nico Collins, in the ‘celly’ studio practicing their celebration routines for the season. The signature celebration dances from players will also be available on Roblox for fans to earn and can be performed by themselves while personalising their avatars. While in the second launch film, Cole Bennett directs this humorous take on rivalry with chaos ensuring at a senior center home amongst the people who can’t put their rivalries aside.

State Farm have Jake as a recognisable main character to its campaigns built up over time and featuring across their various sports partnerships with the athletes. For the NFL kick-off he features in 4 new films to highlight their Personal Price Plan® and why Every Fan’s Game is Personal, with Patrick Mahomes, Fernando Mendoza, Cam Skattebo, Andy Reid and Curt Cignetti as his foil.

This Nike Running video for Masai Russell breaking the 100m hurdles record dropped moments after it happened and goes hard, with Questlove in a record store and an appearance from Jamaican sprint legend Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.

After their near relegation two season in a row, Tottenham Hotspur couldn’t really come out with a hypey new season is here energy video. So someone read the room and got Blind Faith to turn the camera away from the stadium and spectacle onto the fans in this lovely film narrated by actor Himesh Patel called ‘Tottenham til i die’.

Michael Olise has something about him where he just doesn’t want to conform to what people expect from how a footballer should carry themselves. It’s refreshing. He’s nonchalant when it comes to the plaudits and taking part in team celebrations and marketing activity. So naturally here is a stylish video that has Nike ‘freestyle’ energy about it, but is not from any brand partner, simply Michael himself. Love it.

Fandom at all hours. Sponsors are getting better at recognising not all fans are watching sport in the game’s origin timezone, or at times where due to international series or tournaments means early starts or late nights. These two campaigns from Door Dash and Barclays recognise that fan commitment no matter the time of game. Door Dash in New Zealand is on hand to help fans support the All Blacks for their series in South Africa, while Barclays celebrates the game day rituals and routines of fans in the US as part of their Champion of Fans platform.

This week I look at how the new era of the Hundred has been communicated, the massive fan opportunity in the WNBA and wonder what the sale of the LA Lakers means for sports power balance.

WHAT’S SHAPING SPORTS?

The habits, rituals and forces that shape the fans experience.

Nielsen has created an NFL Fandom Index that ranks fans by eight metrics to determine where the most passionate fans are, with Buffalo, Kansas City and Green Bay taking the top spots. Built from over 200,000 adults, the survey covers apparel purchases, event attendance, streaming, social media following, TV viewership, radio listening, betting intent and overall interest level.

Increased ticket prices to the US Open are not going down well with tennis fans. The sport’s ascent across fashion, celebrity and culture has turned the popular tournament into a must attend New York moment. Add the huge participation increase since the pandemic and we’re seeing demand outstrip supply even as ticket prices surge on official and resale outlets. A family of four are now looking at potentially a four figure day out and frustration has been expressed among fans of all ages online who are feeling priced out from an event they’ve had a hand in making culturally meaningful. An all too familiar story across sports.

The trends, opportunities and innovations in how sports are marketed

The Hundred’s standard is up, engagement is up, but people actually attending is down as year six becomes another adjustment year. The Hundred’s sixth and first under the new ownership model has ended with ECB painting a positive picture with increases in TV viewership (+7.5%) and social engagement and views increasing 36% and 55% respectively. The key metric of attendance was down on last year, with the total number of tickets sold and issued being 550,000, a 30,000 decrease. It’s the third-highest of The Hundred so far and the highest of the competitions that doesn’t follow major England Men’s series. The split in attendees were 22% of tickets for junior fans under 16, 40% for families and 28% for women which is positive in doing what the ECB set out to do. These are slightly lower than previous seasons which follows the overall drop off where only the Welsh Fire recorded an increase in attendances.

It’s been called an adjustment year with all the change brought about by new ownership groups with name, kit and colour changes and while some of the cricket was great, with a much stronger level of players this time round, both the men’s and women’s game could be better helped if the owners followed some key fundamentals. Advertising the games earlier and more frequent than they did, particularly the IPL owned teams who may have been preoccupied with that and treated ticket buying behaviour in India and England as the same. Ticket prices should be looked at with some adult tickets costing upwards of £40-55 at some grounds. While I wrote about this before, some teams have now admitted that more focus needs to be on signing players affiliated with the counties that play at the same ground to build familiarity and consistency. I went to watch Southern Brave and the women’s team had four Hampshire players involved including Lauren Bell and Maia Bouchier, while the men’s had none. Hampshire’s best men’s players James Vince, Liam Dawson and Sonny Baker were all playing elsewhere. The Hundred still feels like an experiment in manufacturing fandom, that ignores some of the fundamental factors that help develop it. TV rights are up till 2028 so next year has to surely show this is a format worth dividing cricket fans and impacting so much of the summer calendar.

The WNBA is an opportunity for brands to reach a distinct fan base. The discourse around the WNBA the last year or so and in particular this season has been crazy, taking the attention away from the fact that the players, teams and on-court output is the best it’s arguably ever been. I went to a New York Liberty vs Dallas Wings game last month and the game was great and the atmosphere incredible. A new report outlines the opportunity for brands to reach a fan base that is additive to the sports ecosystem. Comparing cities with NBA and WNBA teams, there is only a small correlation in fans purchasing tickets to both. The overall male/female split is closer to 50/50 and WNBA fans over-index their local NBA counterparts on overall affluence and income.

The NHL is the 4th of the traditional North American sports in popularity and now has the MLS pushing for competition, so it’s interesting to see the sport look to football to help grow the sport, through a partnership with Bayern Munich. German NHL stars Leon Draisaitl and JJ Peterka, with Bayern champion and Canada star Alphonso Davies were all present at the announcement which aims to accelerate the growth of hockey in Germany and the development of FC Bayern in North America. Germany is a key market for hockey with the NHL hosting games there next season, including the Boston Bruins in Munich. The early reaction on the partnership from fans is why? Whenever these cross-sport partnerships are announced, the growth and commercial aims are always the talk of the announcement press release, but beyond the “fan activations” mention, there is usually very little on the what’s in it for fans and why they should care?

TNT Sports will air their pre-match EPL build up for free on YouTube to take their coverage beyond the paywall and try to entice people to sign up for the game the closer it gets to kick-off and their investment level is high.

Publicis Sports and Travis Kelce launch the first Name, Image & Likeness consultation and activation offering called TEKTA. NIL has been the biggest shift college sports has ever seen and it’s completely changed the power balance between players, coaches and their colleges. Some athletes are not jumping to the pros as quickly with the money they can make in school, not just from marketing their name but essentially the salaries that are now paid as compensation from their schools, which see players move frequently to follow the money. Roster building and recruitment has been completely upended. The fact an agency offering hasn’t sprung up sooner is a bit of a surprise given the market is estimated to be a $4.5 billion opportunity, but we can expect TEKTA won’t be the last.

Michigan to allow advertising in their stadium for the first time. The big colleges in sports generate obscene amounts of revenue but now they’re needing to finally compensate players for all the money they help them generate, it’s got colleges looking at ways to bring in extra revenue in the NIL era. For some, it means giving in to advertising as Michigan Stadium, which holds over 107,000 people and turns 100 next year have signed up Coca-Cola, Meijer and Google Gemini to become the first advertisers at the Big House.

Streamers look to expand their sports offering, plugging gaps and taking on tradition. Sport is increasingly the last place for massive gatherings of audiences and streamers have to keep subscriber churn low and shareholders happy, so this week we’ve seen Apple throw their hat in the ring for the golf’s prestigious Open Championship as they look to further move into live sports. Disney has secured the rights to Formula E where Disney+ will become the global streaming home of the ABB FIA Formula E World Championship across 144 territories. DAZN have partnered with KSI and the team he now owns, Dagenham & Redbridge, to enhance production and distribution of the National Conference League South side. The streamer could make inroads in the US while offering a solution for plugging the local coverage issue the major US leagues are having with various Regional Sports Networks collapsing. DAZN have just added 22 Indiana Pacers games to their deals with the Minnesota Timberwolves and become the exclusive direct-to-consumer home of the New York area MSG Networks and YES Network which shows most of the region’s NBA, MLB and NHL teams.

The changes and forces shaping how sports evolve

The LA Lakers broke the record for most expensive sports team for the second time in two years after Bob Iger and Josh Kushner bought the franchise for $12.5 billion. A $2.5 billion increase in just one year is insane. These eye-watering sums also help increase the potential valuations of other teams and in just the last three years, there have been six NBA ownership changes.

The days of local business people owning their local team is a memory, now we’re in the age of the deep pocketed billionaires from the land of tech, entertainment and finance who are seeing sports teams as a way to store their fortunes. With sports teams providing a regular growing revenue through ballooning TV deals and commercial revenue, as well as the cultural cachet and ego boost among billionaire circles, these ultra-wealthy parties are going to increase in sport. With that, comes ownership with financial power that leagues will find hard to control. There are a number of great articles that look into this shift from Derek Thompson, who outlines how American sports laws help a lucky few billionaires get much richer. True Hoop looks at who is actually buying the Lakers and the Washington Post at private equity’s race to own sports.

New Formats growth pains and strategy shift. LIV Golf is hanging on by a thread as they seek financial rescue to replace the money pulled by the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund. The final tournament in Michigan was pulled, vendors are taking legal action over unpaid invoices and players may not have a way back to the PGA tour they jumped ship from.

Sky Sports have not renewed their deal with the Baller League after three seasons despite the broadcaster saying viewing figures are great, with the league stating they were always second to their streaming first strategy. Sky Sports showing Baller League may have been a move to appeal to younger audiences, but the league was readily available for free on streaming platforms so it always seemed an odd move if it didn’t have exclusivity.

A hat divide in golf highlights the tension between the traditionalists and new fans. Golf’s rise among younger and more diverse audiences is reshaping what is being worn on the course, with bolder hats and unconventional designs becoming a merchandise growth category and now a symbol of the tension between golf’s traditionalists and its new generation of fans.

SPORTS MARKETING WEEKLY SHOWCASE

EPL returns. It only feels like a minute since Spain lifted the World Cup yet domestic seasons are underway and the Premier League kicks off this weekend with key sponsors and broadcasters all hyping up the return. Coca-Cola returned to the Premier League last season (disclaimer, I worked on their Guess the Goals campaign and Superfan can last year) and has unveiled a big campaign with Central Cee rapping on an original track ‘The Team’ created for this campaign called ‘Taste Every Second’. The 2 minute film was created by VML with Riff Raff and rolls through the key match moments from anticipation to last minute winners. The integrated campaign is underway and given Cole Palmer has already featured as a Coca-Cola ambassador this year and is often featured with the West London rapper, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see a link up on a coke campaign at some point.

Sky Sports is showing even more games across the season and invites fans to the season long spectacle with a ‘Welcome to the Show’ campaign across multiple channels and platforms, including a commissioned mural in Shoreditch and a landmark 3D takeover of London’s Piccadilly Circus Lights. The installation features a robotic arm spray-painting a white football with the Premier League, EFL, SPFL and WSL logos. Their competitor TNT Sports always seems to put more emphasis on its creative and production and heralds its trophy cabinet of wide coverage across competitions including the Premier League and proclaims ‘There’s levels to this’ in that pursuit of excellence. In the US, Ian Wright fronts a campaign celebrating the league’s growing place in US sports culture with an appearance of New York Knicks and NBA champion Josh Hart and showing the dedication showed to follow their teams across the Atlantic.

As the US Open approaches there’s a heap of activity rolling out from fan experiences in Hudson Yards, to IHG turning the journey from Arthur Ashe Stadium to select IHG hotels in Manhattan into a branded hospitality experience with food, beauty treatments and match content. Heineken 0.0 is rewarding Serena Williams superfans with a chance to score a seat in the exclusive Heineken Suite if they have kept tickets from previous US Opens. For fans who keep tickets as momentos, they can scan them and upload to the fan site, share a memory of Serena and submit for a chance to win. Electrolit is inviting Aryna Sabalenka fans to compete in challenges, including your best Sabalenka grunt at a special pop up, Saby’s Slice Shop where the star will also make an appearance. The drink of the Open is the infamous Honey Deuce, but Moët is trying to create a new consumption ritual with a champagne serve in tennis ball packaging designed for social media and a souvenir.

Nike celebrated one of the best to do it, Diana Taurasi, as the Phoenix Mercury retired her jersey.

adidas took a distinct turn last season to selling its premier football boot franchises by pitting them against each other and they continue to do so with a playful funfair filled world as Barcelona team mates Aitana Bonmatí pulls the strings as a puppet master, while her team mate Vicky Lopez harnesses the storm of chaos. We also see in another film Arsenal players in a tug of war between the wearers of the silos.

Stephen A Smith wants fans to find sports nirvana with the extensive sports coverage across ESPN, it’s the calmest we’ll ever see him.

Formation Games dares football fans who think they can run their club better to do so fin the game CLUB, with Jeff Stelling tracking down fans in a film to remind them what they’ve said and encourages them to step up and prove it.

Today I’ve got something on signature football boots as I wonder why footballers don’t have their own truly signature boots in the way American sports stars do. It’s been a topic on my mind and in the drafts in various forms over the last year and now feels the most relevant time to publish as in the last week we’ve had rumours of Kylian Mbappé leaving Nike for a unique partnership with On.

Can On disrupt the football boot category?

Kylian Mbappé has been at Nike since he was 8 years old which is incredible, yet the 19 year stint has been heavily rumoured to come to an end with the Real Madrid and France striker not keen on renewing his deal, which was reported to end after the World Cup. Reports by Le Parisien and Sportsverse state that any new deal would not be with a traditional rival like an adidas or Puma, but more like On, who are keen to move into football. The shape of the deal would be similar to what the running brand did when they moved into tennis by enticing Roger Federer from Nike with a deal that gave the tennis great equity and greater influence on the partnership.

Since the news broke we’ve seen images of Mbappé back in pre-season wearing Nike still and unveiling the latest Mercurial Kylian Mbappé Player Edition. So all this could be just a negotiating tactic with Nike.

What was intriguing to me about these rumours, was while the reporting mostly centred on the shock of potentially leaving Nike, On’s entrance into football and the equity deal, I was wondering if this did happen, could we see a genuine Kylian Mbappé signature boot?

At Nike, Mbappé wears the Mercurial franchise with his own player editions that vary in look with subtle tweaks to suit his needs, but it’s very much a Nike Mercurial boot. This is the convention in football boots where existing franchises like the adidas Predators, Nike Phantoms or New Balance Furons get a ‘signature’ version for star players where the existing franchise is tweaked and designed with the players needs and preferences.

In a sport like basketball, the brands are creating genuine unique signature franchises from scratch, where the sneaker’s design is created with an NBA or WNBA star and named after them. Signature sneakers for Lebron James, Kevin Durant, Sabrina Ionescu, Kobe Bryant, A’ja Wilson and of course Michael Jordan have become revered silos and brands.

I’m not sure if Mbappé is going to move from Nike, but let’s say he did and you worked at On and were able to secure this landmark deal with him, then you surely have to go further than just an On boot that he’s given input into? You’ve got to go the full way and call it the Mbappé or something with his name in?

In a category that loves bringing out multiple pack releases and colourways during a season, where there’s only so much marginal improvement in speed and weight that is made from one season to the next, could the next innovation in football boots be a new franchise created from scratch with a player that is named after them? Is there a brand willing to build something around one player?

The unbundling of Nike and adidas

In the last decade the traditional chasing pack behind the top two of Nike and adidas as well as the new sports brands entering the market have found success offering athletes more care and attention to build something around them than if they were just one of many at the top two.

Under Armour had this success with Steph Curry in basketball and it’s telling that when he split from them and needed a new home for his Curry brand, the arguably greatest basketball shooter of all time chose Chinese brand Li-Ning to continue having the control rather than return to Nike. In tennis, On enticed Ben Shelton from Nike. Puma have built a world around Tyrese Haliburton and Lamelo Ball along with signature sneakers. New Balance has had success by building a fewer and better approach across sports which has shown athletes like Shohei Ohtani, and Tyrese Maxey that they will be front and centre for the brand instead of in a crowded space.

In football this move from the top players to brands who could give them more attention happened as well. Skechers entered the boot market to surprise and signed one of the top marksmen in the game Harry Kane away from Nike. While the affordable everything retailer Decathlon secured Antoine Griezmann for their increased focus on football. Instead of these landmark moments being launched with a true signature boot, they both support existing franchises with input and player editions for the Skechers SKX and Kipsta.

Was this a missed opportunity for brands making new moves into a category or did Skechers and Decathlon simply see the convention and stick to it?

It’s maybe more understandable that Nike, adidas and Puma, who have decades of legacy in football with revered boot franchises see it’s more effective to build on these with player editions that have bespoke colourways and player needs featured, instead of building something from scratch.

The short lived signature football boots

Both Nike and adidas have actually previously created signature boots for Ronaldinho and Lionel Messi in the past but they were very short-lived. Ronaldinho’s Nike 10R was released in 2006 and can lay claim to being the first truly signature football boot. The silo was engineered with a unique five-eye lacing system, fold over tongue and stud details for futsal-style sole control.

The adidas Messi15 was released in 2015, with a subsequent Messi16 follow up a year later as the boot sat alongside the X and ACE at release with its own Messi labelled boot architecture. In 2017 we didn’t get a Messi17 but a new silo called the Nemeziz, a short lived boot with a taped design effect being used by Messi, but also other players in the adidas family. Post Nemeziz saw Messi return to the F50 franchise which he has been in ever since.

I’ve never been able to find news, quotes or reasons why these two signature boots were so short lived so please let us know in the comments if anyone can shed any light. I can only assume either the players preferred the models they were previously in as player familiarity with a boot is so crucial, there are just too many footballers compared to basketball or baseball players to accommodate, or the brands decided they wanted to build around franchises people already knew. F50 and Predator have been retired before, now they are the core franchises for the three stripes. The Mercurial has been one of Nike’s longest serving boots. If it ain’t broke…

Despite the game’s evolving influence across culture and the increasing modernisation and commercialisation of the sport, football can still be stuck in its old ways and I feel the reason we don’t see truly signature boots like the US sports is simply because, it’s the way things have always been done.

The opportunity is there

As footballers’ status grows into one person brand worlds and they have more influence than ever before, all while a younger generation are increasingly building fandom around individual players I’d love to see how true signature football boots could come to life. Nike and adidas have the marketing power and budget to create something from scratch and add it to their catalogue of boots, without having a negative impact on their other silos.

I think just because the Ronaldinho and Messi examples were short lived, doesn’t mean they were failures. The market and culture is in a different place now. Custom logos and apparel lines are being built around players like Jude Bellingham now, so what could a signature Jude boot look like? In baseball, you can buy the ‘cleats’ version of the Ohtani, but also a lifestyle one. We can avoid the truly weird football boots being worn as fashion statements moment happening again and leaning in on a silo that can be created specifically for the pitch and pavement.

When adidas created the Predator, it was down to the perseverance of Craig Johnston who didn’t give up on developing a truly innovative football boot and convincing the powers that be at adidas to make it. When Puma wanted Walt ‘Clyde’ Frazier to wear their basketball sneakers, it was Frazier who saw things differently and asked for his own shoe that changed the game for athlete signature shoes. Maybe one of the current generation of stars will lead the way and dictate their new boot deal will only be signed if they get their own unique signature football boot? Could that then usher in a new era of football boots innovation and marketing?

That’s what I wanted to find out with my second A Vivrant Field Report.

When the buzzer sounded on game 5 in San Antonio, the celebrations went on for days and the scenes you saw outside Madison Square Garden, at watch parties across the city and the eventual parade were on a level only really the Knicks could pull off. In fact, the fan base and city is still celebrating.

For such an iconic and storied team, generations of New York Knicks fans have had to wait a long time for their third NBA title. They’ve heard the stories of the 70s winners, of Walt ‘Clyde’ Frazier and Phil Jackson from the elders. They’ve sat through the hope of Patrick Ewing, the promise of Carmelo Anthony and moments of madness that was Linsanity. Now, thanks to Jalen Brunson and some help from England’s very own OG Anunoby they’ve finally got a Championship to celebrate and call their own.

I filmed this video in New York weeks after they won the title and it gave me the chance to speak to fans about what it means and how important the game of basketball is to the city as people take to the courts everyday. I got to see a different type of energy I’d not seen in New York before, an afterglow of a fanbase finally getting to celebrate a moment they thought might never come. ‘Knicks in Five’ has become the official greeting between fans and any time I mentioned the win, people’s eyes just lit up whether they were a New York Knickerbocker born and bred, or a transplant who fell under the blue and orange spell. Even with a World Cup on, nothing was getting in the way of cherishing this.

Winning an NBA Championship or any sports title has a certain romanticism to its chase and yearning, then the eventual realisation of its truth. That can maybe feel hard to believe or find when it comes to a sports team who are one of the most famous names in sport with such a massive global fan base, but even as a non-Knicks fan, it’s hard to not feel happy for a fan base that had waited to long. They say a week is a lifetime in sports, so what does a 53 year wait really feel like. I hope this brief snapshot into the New York City mood captures what that feeling is like.

The Hundred is now in its 6th year and is a live case study in efforts to manufacture fandom, how a sport attempts to grow and what happens when outside investment poses a potential power shift in how it goes about that growth.

A staggering £500 million was invested last year when the ECB sold stakes in all 8 teams, half of which are to Indian Premier League owners. The money is a massive one-off boost to cricket in the UK and for some counties a huge lifeline.

Despite more money in the game the 6th year and first in this new era has had a mixed start with attendances down by almost 20% after six men’s games compared to the opening fixtures last year. The women’s games which preceded the men’s at the same venues were down in all bar one game.

Ticket prices for kids remain low but are now a lot higher for adults, between £35 and £55. About 4,000 tickets were given away for MI London’s (Oval Invincibles in old money) opener at the Oval. More positively, this Wednesday’s London ‘derby’ between MI London and London Spirit is close to a sell out and my local side Southern Brave have already sold out their 8th August game against Manchester Supergiants.

The 100 ball format is only played in the UK and was brought in to generate new interest in cricket from younger fans. In the first five years 2.5 million attended, with 203,000 people buying tickets to their first-ever cricket game. But last year a staggering admission from the ECB was that they have no evidence that new fans attracted to The Hundred have gone on to attend other forms of the game.

The eye test of attending games at The Hundred shows younger people and families are attending, but numerous changes influenced by the IPL owners and the way squads are created feel like they’re going to work against all the things you need to do in generating fandom.

Due to changes from a draft to auction, only around 1/5th of players across both men’s and women’s teams are playing for the same team as last year.

Changes in personnel is not new in sport but if the goal is to bring new fans into the game, players are a big part of that and allowing such a large flux in player changes isn’t going to help bring that familiarity and closeness to a team and then desire to watch or support.

With each team playing at a county ground you have fans of the respective counties going to watch, while also the opportunity the ECB haven’t measured so far for if The Hundred moves people into other formats like their local county. Here the player familiarity should be key but it’s remarkable how few players in the Hundred are playing at their traditional home grounds.

Just 12% of men’s and 15% of women’s players are playing for The Hundred team at their local county ground. I write this as I watch the side closest to me Southern Brave play MI London at the Utilita Bowl and instead of Hampshire’s star James Vince playing for the Brave as he had done for the first five years, he is wearing MI London colours. One of English crickets all time greats Joe Root, while not playing much for Yorkshire due to England duties, is associated with that county but plays for the Welsh Fire instead of Sunrisers Leeds.

Three of the teams changed names and all have brought out new kits. MI London have offered a kit amnesty to swap the now old Oval Invincibles kit, but did the owners need to throw away what the Invincibles had started to build up in recognition with the men winning the last 3 titles and the women the first 2? Free kits are on offer at Manchester after their AI launch video shocker that called on the city’s red and blue football divide to unite.

Each match at The Hundred comes with all the bells and whistles around the cricket from live entertainment to interactive activations yet the on field product itself has to be the main draw. The competition runs for just 3 weeks which isn’t long to create any lasting belonging from one year to the next and with all the changes made this year to team’s identities and squads it feels like a reset, rather than a competition finding rhythm.

In the short-term, The Hundred may have saved a few counties from going under. Its biggest success so far is arguably the increased awareness of the women’s game and the money women’s players can now earn. Whether in the long term we’ll still be talking about these franchises, a format played by no other country or most importantly the impact it had on growing younger cricket fandom is unclear.

In other news

LeBron James is still driving the agenda in the NBA after 23 years as he announced his signing to the Philadelphia 76ers in free agency. The signing is interesting for a few reasons beyond how he, Tyrese Maxey, Joel Embiid, Jaylen Brown and V.J. Edgecombe will share the ball.

Topps, who LeBron signed an exclusive trading card and autograph rights deal with broke the news first, just beating out the usual suspects as they announced LeBron makes it official by signing his first ever 76ers trading card.

Bob Myers, the President of Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, who own the 76ers pitched for Lebron on his agent’s podcast, telling Rich Paul “If LeBron is here I would honestly say this is your best chance to win…What I would say to LeBron is if it’s about winning this is the team to win”.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver wanted LeBron to hurry up deciding so they could set the NBA schedule, which usually doesn’t come out till mid-August anyway.

As you can imagine, Philly fans are very happy and trying to get their hands on merch after Fanatics sold out of jerseys in record time.

$10 million is now the starting price to build a college basketball roster after revenue sharing kicked in, with three or four teams in the $30 mill range. Last year Kentucky spent a reported $22 million.

It costs a lot to become an F1 driver and sometimes the chase to fund it leads you to interesting and desperate places.

The NBA and WNBA have signed a multiyear deal with TikTok that will allow creator access to events and live-game discovery through highlights via TikTok GamePlan. The social network says fans are 42% more likely to watch a live game after seeing sports content on the platform.

The WNBA All-Star game set an attendance record with 19,783 at the United Center on Sunday and helped Disney double advertising revenue from last year’s game, attracting 15 new advertisers to the game.

Live streams of World Cup matches on TikTok generated more than 465 million views for official broadcasters throughout the tournament.

The 2026 FIFA World Cup has given a $20 billion boost to the US economy, according to Bank of America.

Noah Lyles has partnered with Onyx Authenticated to create the first Track & Field trading card set.

The line between ‘game day outfit’ and ‘your closet’ is disappearing according to Vogue as a summer of sport changes game day styles.

49% of Gen Z sports fans become interested in a new sport or athlete because of fan content, or from outside on the field output like a documentary, TikTok edit to an athlete’s personal relationship according to a new study.

This World Cup was far from perfect but we can still find plenty of joy through the moments of drama and brilliance the football gave us. And of course the way fans shape the tournament and give it meaning through coming together, showing we’re more alike than we think or are told. After almost 6 weeks and 104 games, below is a list of notes, observations and thoughts as a round up to what I witnessed through a fans and marketing lens, while also spending time out in New York when the tournament reached its business end. There’s no on the pitch football analysis here, but plenty on the fans who made the World Cup, the brands that wanted to be everywhere at it, the content that told the story, the ways FIFA turned the sport into a cash grab and the impact of the tournament.

THE FANS

The fan experience varies inside and outside the stadium. There were noticeable empty seats to begin with but most games were sellouts or near capacity despite the expensive ticket prices and all this will do is make FIFA feel the demand is there so the prices are justified. They said this is the US sports way but I don’t think that means we’re in for a reduction in price when 2030 in Morocco, Spain and Portugal rolls around. FIFA might deem it a success because stadiums were full, but these ticket prices limit who gets to see games and starts turning the World Cup into a luxury, not a game for all, despite what their marketing tries to tell us.

When it came to the TV coverage, most people in the US were increasingly turning to the Spanish language broadcaster Telemundo.

Fan zones, packed bars, town squares and anywhere there was a screen brought people together when their team was playing, showing the World Cup and live sport is one of the last acts that bring large numbers of people together at any one time and can also attract the widest range of support from hardcore to casuals and the curious.

Host cities and local culture discovery. Fans go to a World Cup to support their team on the pitch, but what they encounter off the pitch in the host cities helps shape their overall experience and memories of it.

We’ve had: A Scotland takeover of Boston, football fans packing out MLB ball parks and England fans at the Rodeo. The cult of Buc-ees has grown further. Fans were sampling American fast food culture and a love of ranch. Japanese fans have again gone viral for cleaning up the stadiums. Norway stole the hearts and minds of their hosts, particularly in New York after their two rowing escapades in Time Square. When I visited Nike’s flagship and Classic Football Shirts in New York, their jersey was the most wanted and fastest selling. Egyptian fans checked out of the Trap Music Museum in Atlanta and Argentinian fans visited the College Football Hall of Fame. Mexicans and South Koreans have a football friendship stemming from the 2018 World Cup after South Korea beat Germany and saved Mexico, together they sang “Gangnam Style” and drank tequila in the streets of Los Angeles and Mexico.

Host cities welcome fans in, even if most of the stadiums in the US and Canada decided to exploit fans with ridiculous food and beverage prices. In Atlanta, arguably one of the best stadiums as well as being walkable downtown was the only stadium whose food and drinks prices were fan friendly.

THE BRANDS

adidas vs Nike. If you work in marketing long enough you hear the same old arguments over who won the tournament and why people think they’re absolutely right and you’re wrong over what adidas and Nike are doing. Now watch me throw my view in but all I’ll say is we’re very quick to judge without seeing what happens at purchase and what fans and consumers actually think before we go through this weird ritual of crowning winners. I think both brands did what they needed to do for where they’re both at in their well documented brand & business turnaround jobs and roles as official sponsor and non-sponsor. The adidas kits were some of the best design work ever seen at a tournament. While Nike’s streetwear and fashion collab collections for some of their roster of team’s walk out and warm up apparel deserved the hype. Both brought it with their brand films, adidas paying homage to the playground in Backyard Legends and Nike bringing back some of the star studded epic attitude in Rip the Script that we’ve seen missing from them in football for a while.

Some of the interesting things I noted when out in New York was the difference between how sometimes the official sponsor tag can dictate where resources and budget has to go, at the expense of potentially more interesting work and opportunities. As official partners, adidas had a presence in the stadiums, but did it come at the expense of the streets? Their impressive Soccer City fanzones across New York, Atlanta, Toronto and Dallas let fans watch the games in picturesque settings, but other than retail and a football pitch, there wasn’t much else to catch the fans eye out of watching the games. Which of course is the main point of these but could we have seen something more interesting to engage with? Nike needed to win the streets back and I saw a great retrospective of their Mercurial silo in Mercer Street that showed its legacy and innovation in football culture, while they also ran the Toma Street Football finals at Bryant Park after a number of editions around the world.

Other brands lack an understanding of fans. I wrote a lot about brands and their campaigns in the lead up and as more work rolled out during the tournament and seeing things on the ground in New York and US TV it all still feels like there is a big disconnect to how brands view fans and showing how fans actually behave, interact and show support for their teams. It seems a lot of CMOs want to meet David Beckham or agencies just got lazy with talent suggestions. There’s a lack of honest fan perspectives or capturing the true emotions that go into the game. Instead we get a very glossy and paint by numbers reflection of what brands think fans look like. When it’s done right, like this La Colombe coffee ad, you get to see some actual passion of what football fandom is. When it’s done wrong, it’s cliches wrapped in overly polished grading.

THE CONTENT

Content creation around the game. The 90 minutes was just one part of what we watched with the games fuelling the content eco-system. Reaction videos, memes and analysis filled the in between moments and in the UK I wondered if the main broadcasters BBC and ITV missed a trick by not having some morning catch up show for those not wishing to watch games past our bed times. Spoiler free highlights were great, but sometimes they were less than 10 minutes and left you wanting more for some games. That wake up content indulge where you’re catching up is different behaviour for fans outside the primary time zones and even brought moments where you couldn’t check the whatsapp groups till you’d caught up to avoid the spoilers. My routine of BBC highlights followed by the Rest is Football gave me what I needed from a goals and catch up perspective and the latter kept me entertained throughout. I wonder if in future World Cups Netflix has a play for rights, whether live or highlights and packages these up with the Rest is Football and whoever else they’re working with at that point?

One of the content highlights was photographer Florence Pernet who sat in her apartment taking photographs of the World Cup after not receiving official accreditation. The shots became widely shared and imitated, with Porter referencing Matthew Johnson as an influence from the beginning in one of her posts. Pernet would go on to shoot for Michael Olise and the Portuguese team.

This was the creator World Cup, led by one of the biggest streamers in the world IShowSpeed creating an unofficial tournament song and being everywhere. One of the interesting streamers was Brazilian channel CazeTV, run by Casimiro Miguel, who broadcast all 104 matches for free. His was the only outlet in the country to do so and the channel held the exclusivity for 49 games. Against Scotland they recorded 18 million streams and a peak of 22.3 simultaneous connected devices watching their round of 32 game against Japan.

Creators were big business for brands to bring themselves closer to fans with brand houses catering to them and on the ground content published in partnership. Austin Franklin and Kevin Akoto became the envy of football fans everywhere with their job being to watch every game from a booth in Time Square and paid $50,000 by Fox to do so.

A big difference between Russia and Qatar at this World Cup was the importance of creators for brands and their presence as the category has grown and the world cup in North America became a more attractive proposition to visit. Even with games happening every day the football content diet needed fuelling and on the ground creators and creator led channels like Fusion Josh, Snapback Sports, Footy Adventures and AwayDays made me feel like I was close to the atmosphere on the ground and part of the tournament journey. Whoever you supported, there was respective creators and YouTubers bringing fans along for the journey and it was a tournament where we didn’t have to rely on traditional broadcasters telling us what the atmosphere was like from their corporate media environments, we had fans truly on the ground amongst it telling the story.

Vivrant Coverage. I want to give a little plug here for some of my content published around the tournament at Vivrant. I started Vivrant not long before the World Cup and naturally a lot of the content has been more football focused than is intended over a longer period of time. It’s been fun to write and even create video content around the tournament and I’ve covered how fans shape the tournament in both writing and on the ground video, to those in-between moments as fans come together and discover host city culture. I’ve looked at how brands portray fans and fandom to the opportunity most of them will miss now the tournament is over. It’s been fun, I’d love to spend more time on the ground at the next one but I hope you enjoyed the content as much as I did making it.

FIFA

FIFA’s unashamed money grab. I could easily write a lengthy post about all the bad FIFA brought to the table but I’ll try to limit this to a few areas. This was the first tournament FIFA controlled themselves, with no local organising committee and it was clear to see how much of a cash grab this was. With ticket prices making the games inaccessible to so many, an anything for sale attitude to courting VIPs and changing the rules of football to suit broadcasters, FIFA were here to make money and they expected local cities to help them profit with little benefit to those hosts. With an operating budget of $2.7bn, FIFA expects to make $15bn out of this edition. There’s even a dispute underway over the selling of the grass used in the World Cup final, with FIFA planning to rake in $11.2 million if they sell all 2,026 pieces, despite the cost of the new turf to make the pitch football ready being paid for by New Jersey tax payers to the cost of $13.04 million.

FIFA’s tight grip on who can take part at the World Cup, till Trump speaks. FIFA changed names of stadiums and taped over condiments so only those who paid the high commercial fees could be anywhere near the words World Cup. When it came to people who could access the tournament, they noticeably sat back quietly as Trump and the US did their thing. Referees, teams, officials, player’s families and fans were all left out or their visits made difficult by the US’s tough stance on entry which goes against FIFA’s football for everyone message. When a country’s leader is leaning on a sports governing body to overturn a decision made in the game (no matter how harsh it might seem), we can’t ever go back to an innocent time and say there’s no place for politics in sport when so much of it is shaping and dictating who plays it and who gets to witness it.

Changing what a game of football looks and feels like. The hydration commercial breaks were roundly booed and rightly so by fans in the stadium and it was more noticeably how jarring they’re when watching on US television where the Powerade Hydration breaks had an additional sponsor on TV and then included a load of adverts, even missing action early on in the tournament. They changed how a game of football was played into four quarters and noticeably had an impact on the games, with 32% of group-stage games having an above-average shift in momentum after the first three-minute hydration break, and 26 per cent after the second. Not good for footballers and fans, great for commercial broadcasters, brands and Bon Jovi.

Four quarter football wasn’t the only change made to the rules we’re used to in football with FIFA seemingly willing to put the American Sports stamp on everything. We’re used to pre-game concerts for Champions League and while I have no interest in it, I can understand why FIFA would want to put on a half-time show. It shouldn’t mean extending half time to almost 30 minutes though to fit in what has been described as an atrocity, uniting the world in bafflement or in simple English terms, crap. The final even kicked-off six minutes late due to a drawn out closing ceremony. This felt like a tournament where FIFA didn’t care if any of those hydration breaks, longer half-times or delaying kick-off had an impact on the players, or the game itself - the actual thing people want to watch. As long as it drove revenue and the commercial people handing money over or making it were happy.

THE IMPACT

Celebrating the diaspora and identity. All but 8 of the 48 teams in the World Cup included a player born overseas. Tahith Chong was the only player of the Curaçao squad born on the Caribbean island. There were more players born in Rotterdam playing for Cape Verde than in the country’s capital. England fans in a pub chat hypothetical might wonder what if Leeds born Erling Haaland or Hammersmith born Michael Olise chose them over Norway and France respectively? In fact, nearly a quarter of players at the World Cup were born in different countries to those they represented. Nationality in football is increasingly blurred and it’s reflected in the support as well, with fans who are supporting where they live, where they’re from or where their family was born. This should be celebrated and we saw throughout the tournament that the squads and fans supporting them are a modern representation of society. The World Cup shows how big and closely connected we are with multiple backstories, identities and nations forming who we are.

Soccer in the US and Canada to accelerate further? Mexico already has a rich history and passionate football culture, it’s a real shame more games were not played there, with none from the quarter final stages. It was never going to happen but the most befitting stadium for the final has to be the Azteca. Support for Mexico in the country and across North America showed how passionate they’re for their team and the sport and I hope this isn’t the last time they get to stage World Cup games. If this tournament cemented their passion and football culture, then for the other two hosts it remains to be seen what the long term impact is, but you could tell that they’re definitely growing their own soccer culture and fandom. At a grassroots level the pay to play model in the US is not the best way forward in the long-term, given it limits access to the wealthy only so things do need changing. Since they last hosted the World Cup in 94 they’ve come a long way and it was clear hearing from fans who have been into the sport for a while or were getting into it that things are growing and maturing out there. A new training centre in Atlanta opened in May where all 27 U.S. national teams will be catered for while the sport continues to be one of the fastest growing in Canada.

This wraps the Men’s World Cup coverage but stayed tuned for the next A Vivrant Field Report on New York basketball dropping next week and upcoming content around The Hundred, the Women’s World Cup and NBA Europe.

Today’s article is a special one for me as I share my first Vivrant Field report video and launch of the Vivrant YouTube channel.

I headed out to New York for 5 days to film what was going on with the World Cup and the afterglow of the New York Knicks NBA championship win. I was getting FOMO after seeing what the city was like when the Knicks won, even though I’m an Orlando Magic fan, but NYC is such a special place to me and for basketball. More to come on that next week as the first video is about seeing the World Cup come to life in one of the host cities. I had FOMO seeing it all unfold, less about going to the games, although that would have been nice if it was affordable, but what happens around the games in the host cities as people embrace the local culture and mix with fans from around the world.

With New York home to many different communities, cultures and diaspora from around the world I knew I had to be there. In a moment of genius or madness, on Thursday 2nd July I booked my flight, went out and bought an Osmo Pocket 3, didn’t take it out till the Friday at my airport hotel and then spent the Saturday flight watching tutorials. From there I spent 5 days speaking to fans across the bars, watch parties, fan zones, bodegas, bagel shops and sports stores to ask them What Makes the World Cup so Special?

In this video you’ll see me chat to fans at the House of Goal in Brooklyn where I watched Paraguay vs France. The next day I was in Time Square before Brazil vs Norway, watching the game with Brazil fans in the Football Factory Legends Bar. I had to give myself the night off to watch England vs Mexico which after planning to watch in a West Village bar that become uncomfortably crowded, ended up with me watching on Telemundo in Spanish where an incredible game was matched with commentary where most of the words were not understood, but the feeling certainly was and it made for a great viewing experience. The game of the tournament Argentina vs Egypt was watched at the very impressive adidas Soccer City at the Brooklyn Bridge Park where it looked like Lionel Messi’s World Cup time was over, until he and his team showed they should never be written off. The shift in emotion for the small group of Egypt fans from oh my god this is happening to, oh no, is this happening? when Argentina levelled and then won it showed how football has such a hold on emotions. The scenes at the end where the bulk of the crowd were Argentina fans was one of celebration and relief, with heart felt respect moments shared between both nations.

New York is one of my favourite cities and I visit often, but this time there was a buzz I’ve not felt before. The afterglow of the New York Knicks win is still there and explains some of it, which you’ll see in the second Vivrant Field Report. The excitement for the tournament was real and it wasn’t just from the visiting Norway fans who stole the hearts and minds of the city. Nor the England fans or Mexican and South American communities and diaspora. The USA fans seemed genuinely excited to show the world how far things have come since 1994.

There are 14 different people featured in the film, while many more were spoken to in those in between moments at a bar, buying a coffee or picking up a bagel. This trip felt a gamble at the time, but knowing creating video content for this Substack is something I want to explore, the World Cup felt as good a time as any to start and the resulting film felt so fulfilling to make. Loads to improve on and video 1 will look different to video 10 and beyond, but I’m happy with the results and hope you enjoy it. Hopefully it either reflects your own experiences if you went to any World Cup host cities, or it gives you a sense of what it was like. I’m just pointing the camera and asking the questions, it’s the people that make the film what it is. Those chats on camera and off showed no matter how imperfect the world is, football brings people together and shows how close and alike we really are.

These are the moments I’ll cherish.

On Saturday I spent the evening watching Paraguay vs France at the House of Goal in Brooklyn, where Football Co and a host of brands including Modelo and Jameson laid on activations, a rave and of course the football. I spoke to people to see how they’re experiencing the World Cup.

On Sunday I walked around the streets to soak up the atmosphere as Norway and Brazil fans arrived on mass in Times Square, before heading to the stadium. I then caught the contrasting feeling of football fandom at the Football Factory with Brazil fans packing it out and then onto Houston Hall where Norway recreated that now iconic Viking Clap.

Stay tuned for more. Onto this week’s updates.

One of the great things about Wimbledon is the ‘queue’ and being able to buy tickets on the day. However it’s not for the faint hearted as more and more people camp overnight in it. For day 1 tickets some fans queued for two days to ensure they got Centre Court tickets on opening day. Most days of the tournament people have been told later in the day to not join the queue to avoid disappointment, after over 10,000 fans were in the line for day 1.

The National Basketball Players Association has launched Plyrs Untd, to help more than 500 NBA players use their collective name, image and likeness rights and turn it into business opportunities, partnerships and products.Plyrs Untd replaces the previous licensing arm Think450 with a focus on leveraging the players own brands for their benefit, rather than years of loaning their IP to build the brands of others. Former executive director Andre Iguodala and 4-time NBA Champion, refocused the organisation around a player-first mission and pushed what was possible for the players. Not all every player has the brand power of a Lebron James, Steph Curry or Anthony Edwards so this becomes an interesting and valuable way for players to find opportunities.

Despite an increase in the total prize fund from the The International Cricket Council, some players at the Women’s T20 World Cup were unpaid amateurs, while one player had to quit her day job to be there.

All teams are guaranteed a minimum of £184,245, more than double what was assured to each team in 2024 which is great for the game. Australia earned a winners prize of $2.34m (£1.74m) with runners up England taking home $1.17m (£871,024), the same earnings as the last edition. Yet there is a big difference between the leading teams and the emerging ones with Netherlands only having one fully professional cricketer in their squad, top-order batter Sterre Kalis. The rest are either studying or working while pursuing their cricket careers. In May, Caroline de Lange quit her job as a doctor to play in this tournament.

The tournament has been a great mainstream success with record attendances in a competitive sporting calendar. Overlapping with the tournament has been the football World Cup, Wimbledon tennis starting and the England men’s cricket team creating more headlines for the wrong reasons in their series vs New Zealand. Not to mention battling the heat.

Heatwaves are likely to disrupt the Tour De France. We’re seeing the impact of climate change again in sport as the Tour De France is expected to be impacted with the potentially the first ever stage cancellations as another extreme heatwave grips Europe. “We will obviously experience high temperatures during the Tour de France. Protecting the riders and the public is paramount for us. The watchword is adaptation,” race director Christian Prudhomme told AFP. There is an extreme temperature protocol to follow while additional refreshment zones and even relaxing time limits for elimination may be relaxed to counter the impact. The prestigious cycling championship got underway in Barcelona on Saturday and will finish on the scenic stretch of the Champs-Élysées in Paris on July 26.

Forest Green Rovers have disbanded their women’s team so all energies can be focused on the men’s team getting back to the football league. I can’t believe I’m writing that in 2026. Forest Green insist women’s football will eventually resume at the club but that just isn’t the goal now. Their owner Dale Vince has come out swinging at the justified criticism in my opinion of his decision, even taking aim at the local university for not taking the responsibility on. This comes a month after Plymouth Argyle let most of their players know they wouldn’t be renewing their contracts by email, in cost cutting measures. The women’s game deserves better. Clare Mcewen at She Can Kick It has a must read article on this.

The Lawn Tennis Association is aiming to create the ‘St George’s Park’ of tennis by buying land in Roehampton to build 36 courts and a state-of-the-art academy to develop elite juniors.

The LA Olympics is just two years away and last week was National Olympic and Paralympic Day which saw more than 13,000 young people take part in Olympic and Paralympic themed activities across 180 locations in the United States.

MarketWatch reported that the World Cup has not yet produced a clear hiring boost to the US leisure and hospitality employment.

The hydration breaks are only loved by broadcasters selling adverts and maybe fans of Bon Jovi. It’s been interesting watching the coverage while in the US to see the interruption in viewing experience with the cutting away to ads. An analysis by The Times has broken down how much impact they have had on momentum and not surprisingly it backs up the eye test. According to Opta, the data shows that 32 per cent of group-stage games had an above-average shift in momentum after the first three-minute hydration break, and 26 per cent after the second. Match momentum measures the swing of a match based on the likelihood of a team scoring a goal, calculated bby the ball’s location and the actions of the team with possession.

Campaigns / Platforms

WHOOP & Cristiano Ronaldo

I’ve really enjoyed WHOOPs social content where they visualise real athlete data from some of the world’s greatest as Katherine Rowe writes here. In a more traditional storytelling device of childhood dreaming of the big stage to performing on it, WHOOP shows what it has taken for Cristiano Ronaldo to reach the top of the sport to align with the brands focus on performance.

Everyone’s a pro - Google Germany

A series of short films by Google Germany shows the many ways people watch football during a tournament and how everyone has a take. These micro-fan moments are captured to show how Google’s search can help and is a nice way to show product functionality to genuine real life fan moments.

NFL - Be the Story

The NFL debuted its newest global flag football campaign, “Be The Story” which celebrates the players shaping one of the world’s fastest-growing sports, ahead of the NFL Flag Championships on July 23-26 in Indiana.

Social Media / Content

Rexona has launched an ‘Intensity Radar’ which is a predictive content system that blends real-time football data and fan sentiment to highlight the World Cup games.

adidas are highlighting which of their boots are being worn when players are scoring during the World Cup.

G-Shock - Eberechi Eze is Built Different

Nice story of why the people close to Eberechi Eze of Arsenal and England knew he was built different and going to make it pro.

Experiential / Stunts / PR

British Grand Prix round up

Ahead of this weekend’s British Grand Prix the brands have been busy as Silverstone becomes a wider brand and culture platform, with activity stretching well beyond the racing itself. M&S staged a first-of-its-kind fashion show on the Silverstone pit lane to launch its “Dress to Thrill” edit, using the team garages, cars and race environment as a backdrop. Louis Vuitton has created a bespoke Trophy Trunk for the British GP, turning the trophy presentation into a luxury craft and heritage moment. Disney is also activating its “Fuel the Magic” collaboration with Formula 1 through product drops, trackside retail, family entertainment and appearances from Disney characters and West End performers.

Alongside the fashion and entertainment activity, brands are building more fan experiences around the race weekend. Doritos is bringing “The Crunch Prix” to the Silverstone Fan Zone with interactive games, food trucks and creator-led content, while Wella Professionals is using its F1 Academy partnership to create a beauty paddock activation. Away from the circuit, teams and lifestyle brands are also creating free fan events in London, including Williams’ Piccadilly Circus fan zone, Aston Martin and Celsius’ immersive race-day experience and Lando Norris’ Quadrant pop-up.

Destination Canada - Natural Watch Parties

Destination Canada forgo the traditional watch party by embracing the countries beautiful scenery and places for Natural Watch Parties.

Marmite is helping travelling England fans feel at home still with renamed and branded England travel packs.

Michelob Ultra celebrates some of the stewards from the last time the World Cup was in the USA 1994 World Cup as they were ones who had their backs to the action and missed all the fun.

Sport provides identity, belonging and community, in a society where people crave connection. It allows people to express themselves in ways other areas of life don’t allow them to.

Sport provides those “do you remember when” moments that only the power of sport can provide.

When you get to experience it live, all those emotions, feelings and connection are amplified.

But is attending live sport now becoming a luxury product? Is attending live sport now dividing the haves and have nots?

The monetisation of fandom

The current World Cup in North America is the biggest ever with 48 teams across 3 countries. It has also been FIFA’s biggest money grab ever with average ticket prices seven times higher than the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

A fan attending every match from the group stage through to the final faces costs of at least $6,900, that will be a lot more if they can’t get them via official supporter channels.

FIFA have tried to justify this because of the American market and have offered 130,000 tickets for matches across the tournament at $60 each. That’s less than 2% of the 7 million total number of tickets available.

In the Premier League, football fans have become accustomed to their clubs putting up season ticket and match day prices every season. Only three clubs have frozen prices for next season and for those that haven’t, increases range from above-inflation rises of around the 3-5% mark, all the way up to 15-20% depending on the club and seat.

In the NFL, the cost of a family of four going to an NFL game, including the cost of tickets, parking, and refreshments would cost around $1,340 on average. For fans of the Philadelphia Eagles it would cost over $2,000.

In the NBA, The Oklahoma City Thunder recorded the biggest year-over-year increase in ticket prices at +92.67% after they won their first NBA Championship.

Capacity attendances don’t tell the true story

The cost to attend continues to increase in one direction, but we are not yet seeing an impact on numbers through the door that is going in the other direction.

The NFL, NBA and EPL all recorded around a 97% capacity average for the most recent seasons. So there can’t be an issue right? The demand is obviously there and even at the World Cup, predictions of empty seats seen en masse haven’t happened.

While that demand is there and met, no one in charge will admit a problem. We can’t let those numbers fool us though. These ever-increasing prices do have an impact on fan attendance, sentiment and loyalty. They also impact who is taking the seat, often pricing out long-standing fans to be replaced by those who are wealthier or more casual in support and attendance.

Fans are expressing their discontent and having their limits pushed

86% of US sports fans say live sports are becoming a luxury experience and financially out of reach, with 41% saying it’s very unaffordable.

Affordability was cited as the number one concern among every age group of football fans, with 67% of fans and 53% of professionals saying that attending live sport could become a luxury in the next five years.

Over a third (37%) of football attendees say that current prices mean they attend live events less often. This figure is similar for fans of motorsport (39%), golf (37%), and cricket (37%).

Fans aren’t just assessing ticket prices when making decisions, it’s everything else around the experience from travel, food and merchandise. Areas that have all seen their own increases.

We are also testing the limits of what fans will do to still attend games. During the World Cup, those once in a lifetime or bucket list moments mean fans will go to all sorts of lengths to afford tickets. Selling houses and spending more on tickets than they earn in a month.

Loyalty forgotten

Decades of supporter culture is being forgotten as clubs look away from the length of time someone has supported a club and attended, to how much someone is willing to pay in that seat. It’s all about maximising every seat’s revenue potential.

Tottenham decided to phase out a 50% discount for supporters over 65 last season. Manchester United have moved families with season tickets for generations to make way for more hospitality seating.

Fans are still going through the turnstiles for now, but when does enough become enough? We might not have reached that point yet where it’s impacting the numbers, but it is having an effect on who gets to attend.

Exclusivity over inclusivity

Football, basketball and American Football are three sports with working class roots, but those sports are becoming more exclusive to attend, than inclusive. Of more than 50 people who spoke to Reuters at several stadiums during the group phase of the World Cup, around 30 were in higher-paying jobs with sales, finance and real estate featuring heavily. Four others were business owners, three were engineers and two were doctors. These once every four year tournaments can mean people are willing to spend more, but the makeup of the crowds attending sport on a weekly basis is following similar patterns.

There is now no reward for loyalty nor acknowledgment that the fans who create the atmosphere are part of the experience that is being sold by clubs and leagues. And most of these leagues mentioned all have issues with the atmosphere not being like it used to.

Damaging future fandom

My early memories of sport come from watching it live. I grew up crawling on the terraces of QPR and that early habit formed an affinity and built an emotional connection to the club. Tickets were affordable for the four of us in my family and my fandom deepened. I do worry that even at a Championship club, it’s becoming an expensive day out for a family and something that has to be weighed up with other options and can’t always be a regular habit.

In the EPL, the average season ticket holder is around 40 and clubs just aren’t doing enough to attract a younger generation to attend. Loads of young fans will speak of supporting Arsenal, Manchester United, Real Madrid, PSG etc. and attracting them isn’t hard, but none of those clubs are making it easy for them to attend. Future fandom is built and deepened through participation, access, socialisation and heritage yet clubs and rights holders wonder how to be relevant to gen-z and alpha. The easiest win is to eliminate the very thing they do that is blocking them.

High prices are a choice

Clubs across the World’s top sports leagues are making more money than ever, with some of the biggest broadcast deals ever recently signed so money made from tickets is becoming a smaller portion of revenue. The old saying of the fans paying the players wages hasn’t been true for years. So clubs can easily offer affordable tickets all round and still make bank with all the TV revenue.

They do it because they can. Sell outs and attendance rates will indicate nothing is wrong but while you can measure the tangibles in revenue and capacity, the intangibles that are hard to measure are what you can’t put a price on and that’s the atmosphere, loyalty and connection to longstanding fans and the community.

Over the last decade the change from sports clubs and local pride to big business and global brands has further accelerated, which feels very similar to the gentrification of our cities. The displacement of one set of people deeply rooted to a place or in this case club, being uprooted for a more middle class and affluent demographic.

Attending live sport should be accessible to everyone and no matter what you earn or your background, a sports stadium should be a representation of society. Unfortunately when attending becomes less habitual and more like a one off big purchase, it changes how fans feel about their clubs. The emotional connections become weaker. Future fans are ignored.

The attendance figures might not show it yet, but the discontent is there and the ripple effect of fans losing that connection is real and happening. It might not happen next season or the one after, but there will be a limit to how much fans can pay. If live attendance becomes even more of a luxury than a choice, sport will become all the more poorer for it.

How people watch, follow, express, access and emotionally connect with sport across fan behaviour, culture, media, retail and live experiences.

The many ways of watching Wimbledon. The iconic tennis championship starts today and the All England Club and BBC have announced coverage will remain free to air until at least 2033 in the UK. Their coverage is fantastic and the iPlayer does a great job of allowing you to watch any and every game should you wish, not just the main courts. In the US, ESPN are putting more of their Wimbledon coverage behind higher tiers of their subscription service, much to dismay of tennis fans.

BBC is the next best thing to being there but for those who wish to see it in person, you’ve either got to be lucky in the ballot, rich and connected or willing to put the graft in with the famous ‘queue’ which began yesterday at 2pm. Wimbledon is one of the last premium sports to enable fans to buy a ticket on the day and the queue has become one of the great elements of Wimbledon as people camp and queue overnight to get a chance to buy tickets. Alternatively if you’ve got spare six figures you can skip the queue and buy debentures that allow you to guarantee your seat for five years to all 14 days play. This week a pair went for the eye-watering sum of £586,000.

Coles is fuelling the next generation of AFL fans with their Kids Footy Month. Watching live sport is increasingly expensive which prices out families but in Australia, the supermarket Coles and AFL run Kids Footy Month where tickets are free for under 14s. This is a great initiative as we need to ensure the next generation of fans in any sport can access it live. It’s the best place to plant the seed for long term fandom so we need to see more things like this and it’s such an easy win for brand sponsors.

British fans aren’t staying up late for the World Cup. Ipsos conducted a study with British football fans on the eve of the World Cup to see how the timezones would impact live viewership and not surprisingly engagement is low for the early morning games. Nearly 8 in 10 likely viewers (77%) plan to watch the evening matches live, but just over 2 in 10 likely viewers (22%) plan to watch the early morning games live. What’s striking is the low number saying they’d catch up with the highlights, just over 4 in 10 (42%).

Fans don’t just experience the World Cup in the stadiums, they experience life and the culture of the host nations and one element that isn’t going down well with fans visiting the USA is tipping culture, as this BBC video found out. A happier experience is being had when fans explore things they can’t do at home, like England fans enjoying the rodeo in Texas, Scotland fans taking over the iconic Fenway Park, fans experiencing the food, falling in love with ranch dressing and even famous gas station chain Buc-ee’s.

Fifa is actively and successfully targeting the 1 per cent at this World Cup with half a million packages sold, more than doubling its hospitality revenue record. Concierge and hospitality services and experiences include private jet trips to Marfa, sunrise coffee and yoga on the Empire State Building, a “VIP breakfast” at Tiffany’s and even dinner with Gary Lineker. Some packages for the World Cup final have sold for millions which includes the chance to go on the pitch with the winning team at the trophy ceremony.

How athletes, teams and talent systems are being shaped by performance demands, technology, workload, wellbeing and empowerment.

England women’s Rugby players have secured a 25% increase on their previous contract as part of the new 2026–2030 Rugby World Cup cycle, which will also see the 3 time World Cup winners earn a £100,000 bonus if they retain the title. The deal is part of a larger investment by the RFU in the women’s game with £24 million committed investment over the next 10 years to help further accelerate growth of the sport among women and girls.

A proposed media commitment strike by Jannik Sinner, Iga Swiatek and other stars at Wimbledon has been called off. The players are currently demanding a fairer share of tournament revenues and limited their contractual media commitments during Roland-Garros. This year the All England Club announced record prize money for Wimbledon, increasing the overall prize pool by 20 per cent and totalling £64.2m overall, which sees the singles champions win a record £3.6m each and first-round losers receiving £80,000. However, the players want their share of revenues at the grand slams to reach 22 per cent, the figure they receive at some events on the ATP and WTA Tours, by 2030.

Juan Mata has reached an agreement to purchase a stake in his A-League club Melbourne Victory, following in the footsteps of his ex-international team mate Cesc Fabregas, who bought a stake in Como when seeing out his career. Mata will also take a role as chair of a newly established football committee that will advise the club’s hierarchy upon his retirement. Mata had previously bought a stake in MLS team San Diego.

The NWSL has launched a new footwear framework, where manufacturers who aren’t Nike, the league’s official outfitter, will have to pay for the right to have their football boots visible during games. Puma and adidas have so far opted into the framework and have to meet a minimum cash investment for players. Nike has been the official kit and on-field equipment supplier since the league’s inaugural season in 2013.

A new week, a new class action for the NCAA as it’s claimed a new age-based sports eligibility rule will unlawfully restrict college athletes’ ability to ​compete and earn compensation from their names, images and likenesses. The lawsuit was filed by DeJuan Campbell, who alleges he lost the chance to compete for ​a fifth season and earn additional money based on his name, image and likeness.

Las Vegas Aces guard Chelsea Gray is joining Amazon Prime Video’s WNBA on Prime pregame show as a player contributor, continuing the trend for current players to join broadcasters during the season to provide commentary and opinion. Punditry used to be the post career move but the WNBA and NBA is increasingly seeing active players make media moves. Gray follows fellow WNBA stars Kelsey Plum and Sophie Cunningham, as well as NBA players Kyle Lowry, Tyrese Haliburton and Draymond Green in working with broadcasters.

In the WNBA off-season, players used to head abroad to play in leagues to top up earnings. That changed last year when Unrivalled, a new 3x3 competition founded by Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart, enabled players contract opportunities to receive the highest average salary in U.S. women’s professional sports and a minimum six-figure salary. This welcome avenue for players will now increase with a competing league called Project B launching. Both leagues have similar schedules during the WNBA offseason, so expect competition for players between the leagues. Players signed by Unrivalled to Name, Image, Likeness deals, like Azzi Fudd, have already been swayed to join Project B.

FIFA is helping teams with AI assistance during the World Cup where every nation will have access to unlock information about their opponents.

How sport grows, who shapes it, and how it impacts communities, politics, participation, public value and wider society.

The PGA Tour has announced promotion and relegation with a new two tier model from 2028, when the PGA TOUR Championship Series and the PGA TOUR Challenger Series launched. Tiger Woods was part of the committee that recommended the changes and attended the press conference announcement.

The Championship Series includes the four majors, Players Championship, ​season-ending events and team events such as the Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup. It features 120 players on average and is contested as 72-hole stroke play events with a 36-hole cut. A minimum of 90 players ​will be retained in the Championship Series and 20 promoted from the Challenger Series each season.

FIFA president Gianni Infantino has defended the introduction of hydration breaks at the World Cup, insisting they are driven purely by sporting considerations and not commercial ​interests. “There is no additional ⁠revenue for FIFA, as all commercial agreements were signed well in advance. So, this ​is not a financial issue for us. For us, it is purely a sporting matter,” Infantino ​said in a statement on Wednesday. Yeah right. FIFA might not make money here on this tournament, but this looks to me like appeasing broadcasters who will be asked to pay for higher broadcasting rights in future tournaments.

Qatar Airways’ £80 million title sponsorship of rugby union’s Nations Championship has reportedly been paused due to ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

The Stanley Cup brings a $13.4 million boost to Raleigh after visitors from all 50 states and two countries flocked to the Triangle to see the Carolina Hurricanes defeat the Vegas Golden Knights for their first NHL title in 20 years. According to Visit Raleigh, 112,000 attendees generated the $13.4 million in total economic impact and $255,024 in tax revenue across six sold-out games and watch parties at Lenovo Center.

Campaigns / Platforms

Aguila - Resize the Price

The World Cup of ads, if you will, has been taking place in the south of France this week as the advertising industry drinks a lot of Rosé and talks about ads and AI. It is a chance to see work that sometimes escapes the attention when following too many western brands and trade publications and I was very pleased to discover work from Columbian beer brand Aguila. ‘Resize the Price’ responds to the ever increasing rip off that is football shirts with the campaign giving Columbia fans the chance to own the national team shirt at a reduced prize, in return for wearing the brand’s logo. The bigger the logo, the bigger the discount. Next week I’ll have a deeper run down of the all the sports work that was honoured at Cannes and what the main themes running through were. I will try not to use the headline ‘Cannes they kick it? These ads Cannes!’ but I make no promises.

Wimbledon set to serve up a feast of brand activity

The 139th edition of Wimbledon starts on Monday and we’re starting to see a range of official sponsors and brands connected to the sport roll out creative work, activations and collabs. Lacoste are rolling out a content series of masterclasses with Novak Djokovic.

Wimbledon is bringing SW19 to New York this weekend with Andre Agassi and a host of activations and experiences taking place in Central Park. Lavazza is giving it’s London store a Wimbledon makeover. Evian are releasing limited edition bottle bags created by UK artists Ed Curtis, Hattie Stewart and Diana Al Shammari. Stella are releasing a limited edition strawberries and cream edition with associated merch.

Callaway Golf - Nothing Beats This Father’s Day Ad

Lovely film built around real people rather than the professionals, with the final scene even featuring a member of Callaway’s own marketing team sharing an unscripted moment with his son.

Chase - A Coach’s Influence

Chase have launched a new campaign to celebrate the power of grassroots coaching and their commitment to it, with an emotive film from Droga5 that shows the coaching influence. The American bank sponsors the home nations teams in the UK and has funded 6,000 coaching qualifications to date. The campaign is through the line and supported by a nice social idea by We Are Social, who are behind the Oracle Teller Machine that will embrace the World Cup’s unpredictability through fortune-telling mini statements that show support for the England and Scotland teams.

Volvo - Parents

Keeping with the grassroots theme is Volvo, who celebrate the unsung heroes of grassroots football, the mums and dads who are up early, showing their support, sorting out kit, organising lifts and being the transport to games. Zlatan Ibrahimović appears briefly as star power, but blends into the film as one of many football parents. Nice craft and storytelling by Qvennerstedt Eghammer Malm.

Walmart - Believe

Canadian soccer star Jonathan David stars in a Walmart ad titled Believe, which charts the story of his journey to representing his nation at the World Cup.

Google Pixel - Made for the Beautiful Chaos

I caught the short idents on ITV of Google Pixel’s World Cup campaign after I did a big World Cup ad round up so want to highlight them now as they do a great job of showing product features through the beautiful chaos of fan moments only a global tournament can bring. The campaign from Dark Horses showcases the Pixel’s AI-powered camera features through beautifully shot, visceral fan moments with specific films for France, Spain and Germany.

Heineken - Soccer Translation Billboards

Heineken are running OOH billboards translating soccer terms for fans more used to other US sports across select World Cup Host Cities including New York, Philadelphia and Atlanta.

Molson Coors - The Beer Fling

With so many people visiting North America from around the world and people having their domestic beer habits and go to favourites, Molson Coors are inviting visitors to have a beer fling this summer. I love this. Such a simple insight turned into nice copy and execution.

Coors Light - Tall Girl Can

Coors Light recently became the first Official Beer of the Toronto Tempo, Canada’s inaugural WNBA team and created the Coors Light Tall Girl to celebrate. A 473ml beer can, commonly known as a Tall Boy is renamed for this limited-edition version that will be available at forthcoming Tempo games.

Social Media / Content

Rassvet and Nike SB: Every Dawn Counts

Skateboard brand Rassvet and Nike SB come together for this engrossing film called Every Dawn Counts that explores creativity, rhythm and self-expression.

And the No.1 pick in the draft goes to…AJ Dybantsa’s sponsors

I love how Name, Image, Likeness has helped college athletes cut brand deals before needing to go pro. Now come NBA draft night, lottery picks are already working with multiple brands and those expected to go number 1 will have their brands all lining up with their pre-planned reactive content. When AJ Dybantsa went no.1 this week to the Washington Wizards, Nike, Red Bull, Hublot, Kenzo and Topps were all ready.

KD x Champagne Papi

Been loving the back and forth between Kevin Durant and Drake in these videos to promote the release of the Purple Candies.

The most wonderful time of the year

Fixture release day gives football fans the chance to look ahead with optimism and plan potential away days, look for the tough run of fixtures and how they might start or end the season. Some clubs get very creative with this. Mansfield and Port Vale used the best and weirdest of the internet to reveal theirs. Birmingham and Wrexham made digs to Southampton over Spygate and Charlton brought back their legendary manager Alan Curbishley as their new head of AI.

Experiential / Stunts / PR

Non-Sponsors get around the ban

FIFA didn’t let any stadiums in the US with naming rights to keep the branded name for the tournament as they aren’t official sponsors. Levi’s (San Francisco) and Gillette (Boston) both got around the ban creatively using brand and category cues. Heinz were gifted with an open goal to tap in when a picture went viral of their condiments having the Heinz name taped over. It lent perfectly to their ‘It Has to be Heinz’ campaign and the brand has even created their own ‘Unofficial Stadium Ketchup’ censored bottles and sachets in Toronto.

Look Up

Coca-Cola announced their partnership with the Rugby World Cup with a drone show over Sydney Harbour.

Visit Seattle has created the first drone scoreboard with a nightly show over the city’s skies following each game they’re hosting at the World Cup. People are gathering at the Seattle Center to catch the futuristic scoreboard next to the iconic Space Needle. The scoreboard broadcasts each final score along with the two team’s flags.

Germany and Nike kit tease

Nike are teasing their partnership with Germany on a floating billboard on the Hudson River. It’s going to be so weird seeing Germany in a Nike jersey after 70 years with adidas. Nothing is $acred any more.

The instant classic 2022 World Cup Final achieved a global reach of close to 1.5 billion viewers and over 5 billion people engaged across the tournament. With an expanded 2026 tournament, those numbers are expected to increase and not everyone watching or engaging will be a core football fan and herein lies the opportunity.

In the US, active football followers grew from 8% to 12% after the 2022 tournament and among 18-34s, active football following climbed from 13% to 22%.

Every World Cup generates a broader audience than core football fans where newbies, casuals and lagged fans all watch the tournament. For some, a moment during the tournament will be the spark that turns a passive interest or curiosity into long-term fandom. But no one is thinking about reaching this group and acting as a conduit to their potential long-term fandom once the tournament is over.

When Japan co-hosted the 2002 edition, participation data increased every year with 800,098 registered players in 2002, rising to 835,556 in 2003, 862,045 in 2004, 876,702 in 2005 and 881,880 in 2006.

Every World Cup generates demand and a rise in participation as people become inspired by what happens and want to replicate that on their local pitch. But not every country is ready to facilitate that demand, with others making participation far from accessible.

Depending on which research used, we’re talking anywhere from 40-60% of people watching the World Cup aren’t regular watchers of football. Brands are leaving money on the table by not becoming a conduit or contributor to a growth opportunity that comes around once every tournament.

Not everyone will go on to become a core football fan or regular watcher, but if you said in any other category that you will ignore this much of an audience, warm leads if you will, you’d be getting some serious questions asked by the suits.

Football Italia as the hook

I was 6-years old when the World Cup in Italy happened but I have no recollection of it at the time. However a couple of years later I was given a VHS Cassette (remember them?!) of that tournament by my Nan & Grandad and I must have watched it over and over again. The tournament started a love affair with Italian football and culture thanks to the divine ponytail, Roberto Baggio. I was mesmerised by the skill of Gazza and Maradona. The dancing of Roger Milla. Heartbroken every time I watched England lose on penalties as I hoped for a different outcome (hey, I wasn’t the smartest kid!).

I’d already gone to my first Queens Park Rangers games and kicked a ball with my Dad down our hallway in my kit by this point. That video of football Italia however turned a passive curiosity into what became fully fledged fandom and wanting to play in organised football. The first football boots I wore were Lotto, because of course they had to be Italian.

Every football fan has a story like this, where there was that one moment where it clicked and they became invested in the game either as a fan or wanting to play, often both.

Fandom origin stories

We can easily lose sight of the fact because we’ve passed it ourselves, but every World Cup will be someone’s first moment that they will reflect on in years to come as when they knew football was for them.

Casual fans become regular fans.

Children ask parents to sign them up to organised games.

National team only watchers start following club football.

Social viewers want a more active connection to the sport.

Lapsed players return.

This is effectively an open goal for brands to take advantage of, yet while the new audiences grow, the brand response has not kept pace. Brand activity is focused on activating sponsorship rights, selling product and player led campaigns mostly in the lead up.

I’ve written before about the lack of fan depth in this year’s brand ads, so I’m not expecting much focus on fans and grassroots inspiration after the tournament, but that doesn’t mean time has run out to do so. The audience will be there, ready and primed.

From fleeting moments to attachment

During Qatar 2022, more than half of adults across 34 countries said they planned to watch it, even though only 39% said they followed football regularly. That tournament saw the best ever performance by Morocco, which had a massive impact on the nation’s support. Saudi Arabia’s shock win against the eventual champions Argentina created a new awareness and love for the game. Japan matched their previous best of reaching the last 16 and the wins against Spain and Germany had an impact on the domestic J League, helping attendances rise.

Established football markets also see rises as a result of the tournament. When Lionel Messi finally added the World Cup to his trophy cabinet, football fandom increased further in Argentina, a nation already fanatical about the sport. The Argentinian Football Association directly attributed the tournament win to the growth in fans watching the domestic game.

We can already see a larger increase in traction at the start of this tournament amongst the US public compared to 2022 with early YouGov Sports Index data. While 64% of respondents to a Nielsen pre-tournament report expect their interest in the sport to grow further.

How can brands, rights holders or clubs turn emotional hooks into sustained fandom?

For reaching newbie fans, a brand or rights holder can act as their navigation into deeper football fandom and expand their knowledge.

The emotional attachment and social bonding is a key part of what they felt during the tournament, so why not be the brand that helps newbies find their tribe and community by creating it? Help facilitate those who are experiencing their new found love of football with like-minded fans.

Educational content that speaks to newbies in a way that isn’t patronising but explains key moments of history, elements of the game and player facts in an entertaining way can help build those little nuggets of insights and anecdotes for them to enjoy, re-tell and act as introductions to deeper immersion.

If international football becomes the hook, can domestic leagues act as the gateway to the clubs? For the clubs who have players at the tournament, why not market to the newbies to convert them to become supporters? If an England newbie is liking Harry Kane or Declan Rice, then Bayern Munich or Arsenal should be looking to use that as a way to grow more fans.

From pro influence to grassroots intent

When we think about inspiration from pros to the grassroots game, we see big jumps following tournament success or hosting. After France hosted and won the 1998 World Cup, French football saw around 240,000 new registrations in the 1998–99 season. South Korea football participation rates nearly doubled (5.1% to 9.1%) after hosting 2002. US Soccer projects participation to grow from 20 million to 29 million by the end of 2026 and to 34 million by 2031.

It’s not always a moment that inspires a young child either, as older people also want to take up the game casually. Americans aged 35-44 grew their outdoor soccer participation by 118% between 2018 and 2025. The 45-54 cohort grew by a staggering 247%

How can brands, rights holders or clubs turn pro inspiration to grassroots intent?

Grassroots is where plenty of endemic and non-endemic brands are involved already with support for infrastructure, funding and equipment. But when that initial moment of inspiration into intent to play happens, it is left for the individual person or parents to navigate. Who will be there to help facilitate the demand post World Cup? This becomes a local level engagement opportunity so brands with larger budgets and local presence like banks, supermarkets, food and retail could all get involved.

The grassroots game around the world varies in stature, strength and health. For some the facilities are lacking with too many players and teams needing to share too few facilities. For others the cost to play is expensive whether it’s pitch rental or club fees. No one is ever going to turn down money from a brand that wants to genuinely help grassroots and is an authentic fit.

If someone suddenly wants to take up football at a later age it can become quite daunting to navigate. Can a brand facilitate football for older newbies where standards aren’t judged and the fundamentals are taught?

Are you taking advantage of reach, or growing audiences?

We’ve already seen some wonderful moments on and off the field at the World Cup. Moments that will last a lifetime and for some, will be the entry point to a lifelong fandom and passion for the game. It could also be a fleeting moment that ends once the tournament does.

If you’re working at a brand, club, league or rights holder that is looking to grow fanbases and reach large audiences, are you ready to help turn what someone felt during the World Cup into something longer lasting?

_{Data & Research Used}

• _{2022 World Cup Final achieved a global reach of close to 1.5 billion viewers and over 5 billion people engaged. Source: FIFA}

• _{In the US, active football followers grew from 8% to 12% after the 2022 tournament and among 18-34s, active football following climbed from 13% to 22%. Source: YouGov}

• _{Japan Football Association registered player numbers increased from 800,098 in 2002 to 835,556 in 2003, 862,045 in 2004, 876,702 in 2005 and 881,880 in 2006.
  Source: Japan Football Association}

• _{Adlook research across six markets found that 64% of World Cup viewers were casual viewers. Source: Adlook}

• _{Across 34 countries, Ipsos found that 55% of adults planned to watch at least some of the Qatar 2022 World Cup, while 39% said they followed football regularly
  Source: Ipsos}

• _{The J.League reported record total annual attendance of 12,540,265 in 2024. Source: J.League}

• _{Argentine domestic football had a record-breaking 2023 after the national team won Qatar 2022. Source: Buenos Aires Herald}

• _{After France hosted and won the 1998 World Cup, French football saw around 240,000 new registrations in the 1998–99 season. Source: Le Monde}

• _{Nielsen reported that 64% of surveyed North American fans expect their interest in soccer to grow further.
  Source: Reuters}

• _{South Korea football participation rates increased from 5.1% in 1994 to 9.1% in 2016
  Source: Frontiers in Psychology / PMC – Effect of 2002 FIFA World Cup: Point of Attachment That Influences Mass Football Participation}

• _{U.S. Soccer projects participation to grow from a baseline of 20 million to 29 million in 2026 and 34 million in 2031
  Source: U.S. Soccer – Soccer Forward Foundation Scales Up as U.S. Soccer’s FIFA World Cup 26 Legacy Initiative}

• _{Americans aged 35–44 grew outdoor soccer participation by 118% from 2018 to 2025. Americans aged 45–54 grew outdoor soccer participation by 247% from 2018 to 2025.
  Source: Sports & Fitness Industry Association – Soccer Participation in the U.S. Is Surging Before 2026 World Cup}

This week the build up to Wimbledon kicks off, creators and fans get to experience brand houses at the World Cup, while Lewis Hamilton is here to help us all chill out with 8 hours of YouTube LoFi content…

Campaigns / Platforms

Women’s Aid - The Other Kick Off

Women’s Aid have created another powerful campaign to draw attention to the correlation between major football tournaments and domestic abuse. The ‘Other Kick Off’, created by the agency Elvis (formerly House 337) comes after the 2022 World Cup campaign, ‘He’s Coming Home’ and follows the same focus: raising awareness of how domestic abuse against women spikes significantly in the hours after England games, regardless of the result.

For this campaign, Women’s Aid and Elvis reframe a common match day question ‘what time is kick off?’ to highlight the rise in domestic abuse linked to major football tournaments. This is a powerful campaign that you wish didn’t need creating, but for many women and children, the final whistle doesn’t mean post match reflection, it signals the beginning of something frightening. When England lose, domestic abuse increases by 38%. When they win, it increases by 26%. The OOH displays, online and social will feature the kick-off time 11:37pm - the time Elvis landed on as when abuse would likely take place.

Women’s Aid Ambassador Charlie Webster said: “The World Cup is one of those rare moments when the whole country holds its breath together – united, hopeful, alive! That joy is real, and it’s precious. But for women and children living with domestic abuse, tournament time brings something very different: heightened fear, and heightened danger. That is a reality we cannot look away from. Football is our game. It belongs to all of us, and it should be a place of safety. I am proud to be raising awareness to change that, and make sure that when England plays, every woman at home is safe.”

adidas Football & Lionel Messi - The Last Dance

The Midnight Club’s work with adidas always hits and they’ve done it again with a last dance angle ahead of the GOATs (yeah I said it) Lionel Messi’s last World Cup. Adrenaline pumping.

Wimbledon - ‘Where beauty meets the battle’

Wimbledon launched a new global platform last year ‘There Is Only One Wimbledon’ with VCCP and as the 2026 edition nears, the film ‘Where beauty meets the battle’, captures the essence of the event through the eyes of a Holly Blue butterfly, inspired by a unique moment at Wimbledon in 1986 with Henri Leconte.

La Colombe - Must be the Coffee

Philadelphia based coffee brand, La Colombe is the Official Coffee Partner of U.S. Soccer and their ‘Must be the Coffee’ is a lovely portrait of the city of brotherly love as we see everyday people and everyday life in a documentary style film. There’s more authenticity here in how fans and people’s support is shown than in most of the World Cup ads I previously wrote about.

Apple – Dança

Vini Jr. highlights the AirPods Pro 3 Active Noise Cancellation with some impressive dance moves like he’s flying down the wing for Real Madrid and Brazil.

Oura - Ready?

Oura’s global brand ambassadors, Harry Kane and Declan Rice, feature in a tongue-in-cheek ad about their readiness for the world cup, as the public ask the question ‘Are you ready?’.

Social Media / Content

New York Knicks NBA Championship Brand Round Up

The scenes in New York were wild as the Knicks won their first NBA championship, the merch has been fire and the reactive brand creative has nailed the moment.

Nike & Wieden + Kennedy - ‘Sleep Well, NY’

Lifelong fan and director Josh Safdie, who was at game 5 in San Antonio sat next to the star of his Marty Supreme movie, Timothée Chalamet, captures the emotion of the win in his high octane, intense creative signature. Soundtracked to Billy Joel’s 'New York State of Mind’, a fan in a Jalen Brunson jersey runs through the streets of Manhattan after the win, until he arrives at Madison Square Garden in what could easily be a scene from a Safdie film.

Michelob ULTRA – Pass for the Ages

NBA sponsor Michelob’s ode to the win sees Walt ‘Clyde’ Frazier and Jalen Brunson exchange passes to link the last era of championship winning Knicks to the latest.

ESPN Social

Nice acknowledgement of some famous Knicks fans…

Michelob Ultra - World Cup Legends Man of the Match

File this under ‘wow, that’s really surprised me’ as at the World Cups prior to 2002, there was no Player of the Match award so in a lovely bit of nostalgic storytelling, education and acknowledgement Copa90 and Michelob Ultra have launched an investigation to finally recognise 580 players for their endeavours. Michelob is the sponsor of the 2026 player accolades and the Superior Player of the Match award will be extended to every game from 1930 to 1998 That’s over 15,000 players and over 870 hours of football analysed so every single game has a winner. So far Ronaldo Nazario, Roberto Baggio, Jay-Jay Okocha and Lothar Matthäus are some of the players receiving their awards.

Axe / Lynx - Wiener Man

The Axe / Lynx brand (and associated country relevant brand names) ‘Smell your best when you’re at your worst’ campaign connects product to moments of support across a series of fan vignettes in a classic ad format. Now they’ve revealed they were behind a stunt that featured a man in a full wiener costume and famous fitness influencer Cheyenne Moles, spotted all over Mexico City during the World Cup Opening Ceremony week. The stunt by LOLA, also saw the wiener man and fitness influencer appear at celebrity rooftop restaurants and five-star hotels to create mystery and conversation on social.

F1 - Lewis Hamilton Watch Along

The world of LoFi YouTube content provides a calming backdrop to work, homework, chores or whatever you might be doing when focus or calm is needed. For F1 fans you can now enjoy 8 hours of uninterrupted 4K ambience featuring Lewis Hamilton taking in the stunning views of Monaco.

Ikea - Assemble the World

​IKEA Canada and Dentsu Creative have launched 'Assemble the World', a clever and charming way of showing familiar IKEA products and repurposing them into a series of country flags for the World Cup.

Cass - ‘Wide Cup’

South Korea’s best-selling beer brand Cass are running a competition to see who opens their mouth the widest while watching the team in the World Cup.

Experiential / Stunts

The House of…

The House of (insert brand or passion point) has been the default naming device for any fan experiential activations around sport in recent years that combines the sport with cultural crossover activity, games, creators and talent. During the World Cup USA Soccer is hosting a US Soccer House in Los Angles and New York with associated sponsors Michelob, Bank of America and more.

The House of Fresh is Uniliver’s creator hubs across Mexico City, New York and Miami. where they can design custom jerseys, pose for pictures to be turned into collectible Panini trading cards, put charms on trendy phone slings and play foosball.

‘The Beautiful Dome’

One of the Vancouver’s most iconic landmarks, Science World has been rechristened ‘The Beautiful Dome’ a huge, 360-degree, 40-metre-diameter re-creation of the Adidas official match ball, Trionda and will include an exhibition showing how innovation has shaped football’s continuing evolution.

Getting paid to watch football all day - the dream job

Austin Franklin and Kevin Akoto have officially been selected as the luckiest football fans going as FOX crowns them their Chief World Cup Watchers where each will be paid $50,000 to watch every match of World Cup live from a custom-built viewing cube in the heart of Times Square.

How people watch, follow, express, access and emotionally connect with sport across fan behaviour, culture, media, retail and live experiences.

Bootleg merch is the coveted and authentically New York souvenir of the Knicks Championship

The New York Knicks finally did it, winning their third NBA Championship after a long 53-year wait and fans have snapped up the merch for it. The official hats, tees, jackets and Funko Pops are selling fast or sold out, but the real New Yorkers are buying the more coveted and creative bootleg merch. Takes on iconic A Tribe Called Quest albums, DIY versions of Taylor Swift’s viral ‘Stevie Knicks’ tee and more are being sought after and one fan is tracking them all on the nostalgic looking site https://knickknacks.nyc/ Hat tip to Victoria Buchanan for this one.

Fans are breaking the bank and going into debt to fund once in a lifetime World Cup trips

One fan paid 30,000 pesos ($1,750 / £1,300) for a ticket to Mexico’s opening game, worth about three months’ rent to many residents of Mexico City. In Morocco, the average annual salary is estimated to be less than $7,400, but some fans are paying double that to see one of the dark horses play. England ‘superfan’ Andy Milne sold his house to fund his trip. Some fans started saving once the previous tournament ended, while others have taken out credit cards to fund it. If your team makes the final and you go to every game, it will cost about £5,225 in the lowest price range, £8,580 in the middle tier and £12,350 for the most expensive tickets.

FIFA’s choice of dynamic ticket pricing and premium stadium costs, along with rising global travel expenses has created a model that not only risks reshaping who can afford to attend games, but also forces the desperate lengths fans will go to, so they take in what are once in a lifetime, bucket list moments.

Expensive stadium scran

It’s not just the tickets to watch games that are expensive. As the tournament completes its first week, we’re seeing further examples of how the World Cup looks like an exercise in extracting as much money as possible out of fans. Food and drink prices in stadiums have shocked fans not used to the premium you have to pay when watching sports in the US and Canada. Standard food fare and beers are reaching $20, while some stadiums are charging $8.25 for a bottle of water. FIFA takeover the stadiums and buy out the food & beverage providers, who still facilitate everything and set prices, with FIFA’s sign off. The Mercedes-Benz Stadium Atlanta Stadium deserves praise for sticking to their fan friendly prices where meals can be bought for as low as $6.

It’s the fans that make it, always

What happens on the pitch rightfully generates the headlines, but the memories are made by the fans and this World Cup has already seen some great moments. Japanese fans have stolen locals' hearts by cleaning up the stadium after their game. Norwegians are rowing, Merlin the Duck is the unofficial Mexican mascot and the Tartan Army took over Fenway Park.

How athletes, teams and talent systems are being shaped by performance demands, technology, workload, wellbeing and empowerment.

Another change to NIL is on the cards?

Name, Image, Likeness has made college sports almost unrecognisable from where it was 5 years ago and a welcome game changer to college athletes being able to earn money. One part of NIL is the athletes can cut brand deals to earn money, while the other part is they can earn money through a sum paid by their colleges as part of revenue sharing. There’s no cap on brand deal revenue, but the colleges do have a $20.5 million per season cap they can spend on their roster of athletes across their sports, which has become an issue. A new antitrust lawsuit has been filed against the NCAA, seeking to lift restrictions with the argument being the cap impacts a players earning potential and is causing financial constraints on competition for players. The suit seeks damages on behalf of affected college football and basketball players across 17 states including California, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Tennessee.

SGA returns to Nike, but have they fumbled Caitlin Clark’s signature sneaker?

Having your own signature sneaker is a status move in basketball and a sign you’re one of the sports cultural and commercial movers. When Nike and adidas dominate so much of the basketball category, players often have to look at the tier below or even newcomers to be able put themselves central to a brands focus. New Balance, Puma, Under Armour, Converse, Reebok, Anta, Li-Ning have all looked to carve more of a share of the market by enticing players who want to have more control and step outside of the shadow Nike and adidas star talent has. When Shai Gilgeous-Alexander moved from Nike to Converse and made him creative director of their basketball division, it looked like another example of the shift. This week, SGA, the back-to-back MVP returned to the Swoosh as Converse’s move to regain a standing in basketball seems to have been shut down by its parent company. Is SGA unhappy at Converse? Or have Nike simply decided they made a mistake letting him go in the first place and made a portfolio play and power move to rectify it? Time will tell but hopefully the next Shai 001 update or new silo won’t take as long as Nike have with Caitlin Clark’s sneaker.

Caitlin Clark has transcended basketball and brought so many fans into the sport since her amazing college run with the University of Iowa and now in the WNBA with the Indiana Fever. Nike signed Clark to a name, image and likeness deal in October 2022, before her junior season, then a fresh $28 million contract in April 2024 for 8 years, as Clark entered the WNBA. Her first signature sneaker, the Caitlin 1 and apparel line will go on sale in October, with the sneaker potentially debuted tonight. Given it was known Clark would be a start during her Iowa days and signing her to a full deal saw a bidding war, it seems very strange it’s taken so long for Nike to release the Caitlin 1. Has the changes at Nike as they attempt their turn around under CEO Elliott Hill seen the ball dropped with a star that could arguably draw Lebron James and Kevin Durant popularity to the category?

FIFA in something good shocker

FIFA has launched the Female Health and Performance Project, a new global initiative that will provide science-based knowledge tailored to female players. Between 2014 and 2020, only 34% of participants in sport and exercise science studies were women, while just 6% of sport science research focused exclusively on women. This new project aims to respond to that gap in sport science with 30 online modules across 13 topics and resources for players, coaches, medical staff, parents, the general public and all 211 FIFA Member Associations.

How sport grows, who shapes it, and how it impacts communities, politics, participation, public value and wider society.

The NBA and NHL finals record best figures for years

The New York Knicks long awaited return to the top of the NBA drew the biggest viewing figures for an NBA Finals since Michael Jordan played for the Chicago Bulls. The series with the San Antonio Spurs was close and entertaining throughout and the deciding game 5 audience peaked at 33 million, averaging 24.5 million viewers on ABC and ESPN. This made it the most-watched since the 1998 NBA finals between the Bulls and Utah Jazz, which was to be Jordan’s last ever finals. This year’s ratings were also the highest on ABC and ESPN since they started broadcasting the finals in 2003.

Record figures for Women’s Champions League watching

The Women’s Champions League doubled viewing during the 2025/26 season, expecting to reach at ‌least 44.5 million once the final was included, UEFA said in a report. 39.7 million viewers watched across ​the Champions League before the final across 207 territories, with 30 free-to-air ⁠partners showing the final, making it the ​most widely available title match to date. Social media engagement also climbed considerably, with a +50% year-on-year increase in video views (947 million) and 52 million engagements.

New CBA expands WNBA games and player opportunity

The new collective bargaining agreement between the WNBA and WNBPA will see an increase in games next season, rising from 44 to 50. Another element of the agreement is giving players looking to gain a chance in the league or keep them from falling out a new opportunity to do so with the development deals introduced. The league has recently expanded to 15 teams, but there’s no development league supporting it, like the G-League does for the NBA, so chances to impress and make any 12-player roster is small. Now teams can offer the new development deals to two developmental players per team, who can practice, travel with the team and are able to be activated for up to 12 games. So far 13 of the 15 teams have used at least one development deal. Teams are using them to take a look at players who have been waived elsewhere, like the Connecticut Sun have done with Hailey Van Lith, or take a closer look at international players that have no WNBA experience.

Saudi Arabia’s mega futuristic Tennis centre

The New York Times reveal details of the new National Tennis Centre in Qiddiya City, funded by the The Qiddiya Investment Company who are owned by the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF). The new centre will be ready for the first edition of an ATP Masters 1000 event in 2028 and will have 30 courts, 28 hard and two clay, including a 15,000-capacity Centre Court with a retractable roof, and three further show courts, one of which will be an 8,000-seater with a roof.

B teams in WSL?

In May, a proposal to allow four academy sides from Women’s Super League clubs to join the third tier in 2027 was approved by the FA Women’s National League board. Understandably, this has divided opinion with current champions Manchester City, a side with hefty resources all in favour, whereas 52 Women’s National League clubs have formed an alliance and are pushing for a vote on the matter. A final decision is expected in July.

MLB Lockout? The players think so

In the annual MLB player survey by The Athletic, there’s a strong belief the league is heading for a lockout in 2027, which would derail the turn around the sport has had during the last few years thanks to the pitch clock change and star players like Shohei Ohtani making the sport more accessible and entertaining. One of the key points that players won’t agree to is the likelihood of a salary cap.

BIG3 to go public

Ice Cube’s the BIG3, the basketball 3x3 league that features former NBA players is about to enter it’s 9th season and is going public, entering an agreement with a special purpose acquisition company to do so. The deal values the league at $290 million pre-money, with 100% of the existing equity expected to convert to common stock of the combined company at closing, sometime later this year.

It feels very surface level across a variety of adverts from global and local brands around the world cup for this year’s edition. There are some exceptions and standouts, but for the most part they stick to the default convention of fan celebration when a goal is scored and maybe, just a little moment of jeopardy before the high.

This creative execution is often the case when brands do the big campaign ads around football, but during a tournament where the world’s attention and brand bucks is focused, it’s when it really hits home how conventional, lazy and all the same it feels when every ad defaults to the mean.

There is little in the way that shows the breadth of emotions or depth of experiences fans go through and what international team fandom looks and feels like.

Fandom is broad and deep

Fandom is celebrating goals, but it’s also the anticipation leading up to the game, the moments after and until the next one. The tension, debates, rituals, superstitions, doubts, excitement, travel, optimism, planning, lows, routines, the places and spaces fandom is expressed.

Fandom is showing support for a team, but it’s also connection, tribalism, escapism, identity, bonding, a sense of place, pride, belonging and coming back for more when you should know better.

International fandom is supporting a nation, but it’s increasingly more complex and layered, with multiple teams favoured. People support where they’re from, where they grew up, where they now live or family ties are. It’s putting aside club loyalties and rivalries for a common cause.

We’re barely a week into the tournament and we’re already seeing the diverse make up of fandom, the different rituals and routines, people from all walks of life coming together in unison. It actually does look like a melting pot of cultures coming together.

The brands show none of this to any great length which is a shame given the number of big global brands who are sponsoring or advertising at the biggest and most global world cup to date.

It’s not just football where fandom is broad and deep. Look at any of the major sports leagues around the world and you’ll see fandom expressed across a breadth and depth of behaviours and emotions. The names of the stadiums and places for where it’s expressed might be different, but how and why it’s expressed will look just as universally similar and layered as any sport.

The Five Boroughs to the World

On Saturday in Texas, at the Frost Bank Center, fans of the New York Knicks had taken over the arena, just like they had done throughout the NBA play-offs to create a slice of MSG on the road. Ticket prices reached record highs and while it’s easier for a Spike Lee or Timothée Chalamet to afford those prices, there were plenty of Knicks fans that had to be there, at any cost, to witness the moment the team put a 53 year wait for a third NBA Championship behind them.

Back in New York city, across the five boroughs people, blocks and neighbourhoods came together on a night where, political views, religious beliefs and quite simply life, were put aside to support and hope one of sports most famous teams could deliver. Generations of fans had never seen the Knicks win the chip. They might have heard about the folklore from their elders, or in bar chat. For those that saw it in 1973, they may have never expected it to take as long to see it happen again.

Those that were celebrating in San Antonio, New York, across the US or around the world were united in their love for the blue and orange. They might be MSG regulars or once in a lifetimers, born and raised New Yorkers or transplants, locals that went global or have followed from countries and timezones a far. This was a moment shared even if the proximity, intensity and relationship with the Knicks varies. Fandom is expressed on different levels and layers, but it all forms part of someone’s identity and Saturday night wherever people were gathered or watching, they all felt a sense of belonging.

Multi-layered fandom

I was born in the 80s and grew up in Southampton, a port city on the South Coast of England. I didn’t support the local football team, instead following my Dad’s and his Dad’s passion for Queens Park Rangers, the closest team to where they grew up in London. During the World Cup I want England to win it. It’s those two teams above anything else.

I’m also a child of the 90s and for those who grew up in a world before Sky TV was showing wall to wall football, Channel 4 brought us into a world of Italian skill and sophistication with their weekly Serie A broadcasts. Everyone had an Italian team of choice due to this. Mine was Juventus and the 12-year old in me was overjoyed when I finally paid a visit to Turin in 2024 to watch a game. When Sky started showing Spanish football, everyone at school started watching and picking a team. This was the year of Ronaldo’s incredible one season at Barcelona so I had to get his shirt on a family trip to the Catalan capital when I was 13. In March, I went to watch cult football team St.Pauli, a team I feel passionate about that does things differently on and off the pitch and whose left leaning views and outlook on life reflects my own. I might not support the local football team where I was born, but I express local pride for and support my county’s cricket team, Hampshire. Most mornings during the NBA season you’ll find me watching the previous night’s Orlando Magic game and making pilgrimages to Florida for games.

Back to the World Cup. National-team loyalty is no longer simple. Fans support where they were born, where they live, where they grew up and where their families come from to create layered, multi-team identities. Across the USA, Canada and Mexico, 74% of fans support more than one nation, 12% above the global average. The most football-passionate demographic in the USA will be Hispanic-Americans.

These are the realities of modern sports fandom. The beauty is in the complexity, the messiness, the contradiction and all the ebbs and flows.

Loads of brands say that they’re for the fans and part of sports culture, but this has to mean more than just defaulting to fan celebration conventions. Sticking to the surface level may give the impression of reflecting fandom, but it misses the opportunities to show a realness that fans know, see and live.

The opportunity

When it comes to sport, we’re not selling brands and products to rational people. We’re trying to sell brands and products to people who are deeply emotional and passionate about the team(s) they support.

The brands that go further are the ones who grasp the differences between a New York Knicks fan in the Bronx and Berlin, as well as the unifying characteristics. They’re the ones who show up all year round in the moments in between, not just the tentpole. They’re the ones who understand a fan may support the country their family was from first, not where they were born or currently live.

Sport delivers reach, but the old way is thinking reach will equal success. Credibility needs to be earned to create meaningful opportunities to sell to fans. Fandom is now so vast and complex, you have to understand the differences and unifying factors across the various sets of fans and create work that resonates with all. There’s richness in the unifying characteristics of fans beyond goals celebrations. There’s even more richness the deeper you go when figuring out what appeals to the different relationships fans have with their teams. It requires a multi-layered approach. That’s the new way to think.

When we stick to surface level convention, we may be seen to be ticking the right boxes, but to really matter to fans, it requires a deeper understanding and a willingness to embrace the complexities of fandom.

My goal at Vivrant is to continue to highlight, explore and show the breadth and depth of that complexity and the beauty that lies in sports fandom.

I want this to become an essential newsletter each week for sports marketers and anyone working across sport to have a variety of marketing in one place as inspiration. There will also be some commentary on any insights or trends coming through in the work and bigger picture across the category.

On to this week, where we’ll kick-off with a World Cup special that rounds up what I’ve seen across the brand ads leading up to the tournament, which sees a lot of David Beckham, some work that truly stirs the emotion and question marks on how football fandom is portrayed.

Conventions

All the hallmarks of football adverts are represented with the classic conventions of national pride, celebrity cameos, slow-motion action, pauses before a special moment, state of the nation manifestos, inspiration journeys and hard work creates the magic. Just because an advert follows convention, it doesn’t mean it’s bad as the execution of that convention becomes more key. At the World Cup we’re talking big production budgets and media spend which I think has made a lot of the big convention following ads feel too glossy. They’re so surface level where the lack of any depth, tension or interesting fan insights means you could swap logos from another brand within the category. You will likely only remember some of the brands because of the sheer volume of product nods and frequency in the media buy. Most of the big players are trying to reach more than just football fans so playing the hits becomes a default, rather than attempting to disrupt the category and stand out.

Football, not soccer

Where the World Cup is being hosted was a natural one to lean on, with the football vs soccer language use and difference in cultures so there’s a lot of “it’s football, not soccer” lines in adverts. I won’t be featuring gambling ads on Vivrant, however one known for their banter and humorous adverts has made one of the more enjoyable it’s football, not soccer and English vs US culture very well, featuring Danny Dyer and Rob Lowe.

David Beckham: Everything, Everywhere, All At Once

Goldenballs has been putting in the work this tournament and it feels like every other advert features him, whether it’s pulling pints for Stella, pushing Pepsi, flogging burgers, looking for crisps, home improvement, surprising telco customers, or rolling back the years for adidas. He’s doing so much that for Lenovo they decided to play up to this with a ‘got a lot going on’ angle in Maxium David. Talent is a tried and tested formula to bring attention and credibility to a brand or product and Brand Beckham is a mega operation, but I do wonder if too much exposure of the same person across brands begins to diminish a brand’s communication?

Backyard Legends vs Rip The Script / adidas vs Nike / marketers vs audience

adidas vs Nike is an argument as long as time and a prime target for marketers to weigh in on who won, why one ad is better than the other, or simply why one didn’t work for them. That last point is funny to me, as it only takes a few moments to get into the comments below on social to see how well both Backyard Legends and Rip The Script have done to appeal to the people the brands are actually wanting to appeal to, which isn’t marketers on LinkedIn (or writing weekly Substack creative showcases ;-)).

Both are brilliant, epic and what you want to see from the global sportswear giants. I know both have the budgets and talent to do so, but my main takeaway from both is the audience will watch longer form brand films if you make them entertaining enough. Neither felt long when watching, they kept you hooked to see what would happen next and the final pay off, while both were re-watchable for the easter eggs, things you might have missed first time and simply because they deserved a second watch.

Both brands are in different places right now, adidas further along their turnaround than Nike, but talk of the latter’s demise is foolish given the sheer size of the company and share of the market they still have. They’re still Nike and Rip the Script showed that it was perfect for what the brand needed to do, reminding people of who they’re in football while giving the audience a roll call of talent across a high octane production. Sometimes that just needs to be ‘the idea’. For adidas, Backyard Legends continued what their creative work has been doing well for a long time now: weaving performance, sports talent, lifestyle and cultural crossover talent across an ode to the places where everyone starts to create their legend, the streets. It felt like an exclamation point at the end of their World Cup lead up work that saw some of the best kit and apparel product storytelling. Both brands have excelled on kit and cultural collab launch content while Backyard Legends and Rip The Script were reminders that sometimes, you don’t need to pick a winner, just enjoy them both because everyone wins.

Role of product

If you’re a sports brand selling kit, boots or equipment, there’s a natural product link to talk about. For non-endemic brands in sports, you have to work harder to show a natural product fit and earn credibility. Products like food and drink can be easier to show a natural role in the fan experience than other categories like finance or cars.

This World Cup has seen a wide range of how brands are showing product roles, in some instances as the natural accompaniment like Brahma and Uber Eats. Duracell goes for the endurance metaphor with their Lionel Messi ad and Valvoline for those who are ‘driven’. Johnnie Walker has released a 24 year old whisky in Brazil which coincides with the length of time since Brazil last won the World Cup. Something Chivas Regal did with Arsenal recently. I can imagine the calls to the distilleries to see how much whiskey of those ages they had. Some use football vocabulary and gestures to link the product like Visa ‘Tap In’ or Coors use of Andrés Cantor’s legendary “GOOOOAL!” for a bar order. Some have pushed the product so far front and centre it feels over the top, even if the product does naturally appear in the fan experience or they’re a long-standing sponsor. Coca-Cola are one of the longest World Cup sponsors but their ‘Uncanned Emotions’ puts football, fans and the occasion secondary to the product.

How fandom is portrayed

Interesting to see how US brands portray fans. Jim Bean acknowledges fandom happens everywhere, not just in the stadium. While Lay’s tells us the fans who always win are the bandwagon fans and encourage you to switch teams if your’s isn’t winning, then another if they don’t and so on. It comes across as putting the very nature of fandom down, but then it’s also starring Will Ferrell and is all very light hearted in execution. Axe / Lynx exaggerates the rituals and superstitions of football fans for a sign off ‘Smell Your Best When You Look Your Worst’ that just about strays the right side of pastiche. Budweiser, Coca-Cola and Stella are three of the brands that all feature fans heavily in their ads, in moments of joy and despair.

I have to say though, there is a lack of real fan culture and depth of fandom shown across the many ads I’ve seen. Beyond the obligatory fan goal celebrations and mini moments of jeopardy before the highs, there is little in the way that shows any of the tensions, breadth of emotions or different experiences fans have around the game. I felt like there was a real opportunity with this World Cup being its largest ever, to show the melting pot of cultures that are going to come together. We’ve already seen great scenes of fans mixing and celebrating together at the early games. I wrote before about how this World Cup highlights how increasingly more complex and layered fandom is with fans not always supporting one team but where they’re born, grew up, live or where family are from. This is a positive thing and the diaspora stories are what makes football a truly global game and these things should be celebrated. None of this is shown in brand comms which is a shame given the number of global brands who are sponsoring or advertising. A lot of brands say in their ads or supporting press releases and trade interviews that they’re for the fans, but this only seems to mean showing celebration conventions.

Personal faves

Big faves for me personally are no surprises, Backyard Legends and Rip The Script. The Trainspotting vibe of adidas football’s Scotland ad is great. I also love Brahma’s energy of Brazil football passion mixed with recreations of their classic World Cup moments. SuperSport / CANAL+ ‘Everything Can Wait’ in Africa shows the impact on the daytime when following the tournament through the night due to time differences. Flamin’ Hot® ‘The Warmest Welcome’, sees Mexico fans get revenge on Arjen Robben and Maxi Rodríguez, two players that broke their hearts in previous tournaments. I like the France’s players going all Hollywood in Orange’s ad. EE’s ‘Yes Boys!’ is a powerful film about how football communities can help counter the pressures young boys face online and is one of the most emotive films to coincide with the World Cup.

Despite working in advertising for a long time, I clearly am a sucker for big star talent, nostalgia and emotion drivers. We can sometimes over-intellectualise things working in marketing, but if we entertain consumers, make it memorable and authentic to their experiences of sport or fandom, you go a long way to winning. This tournament’s set of brand ads are enjoyable in the most part, with some really great stand-outs. I just wish we could see more depth and nuance explored when it comes to fandom and move beyond the familiar fan tropes and convention. Let’s close the gap between the talk of being there for the fans and part of fan culture in press releases with what that actually looks like in real life, being reflected on screen.

World Cup Adverts Creative Showcase by Category

Sportswear

adidas - Backyard Legends

Nike - Rip the Script

adidas - Scotland You Got This (Trainspotting inspired)

adidas - Japan Kit Launch

Nike - Canada Rip the Script

Telco

EE - Yes Boys!

At&T - These Neighbours Didn’t Know Each Other

Orange - Les Blues are going to America

Verizon - Golden Ticket

Tech

Lenovo - Maximum David

Hisense - Our Host

Google Pixel - Made for the Beautiful Chaos

Media

Canal + / Supersport - Everything Can Wait

BBC - Let’s Make it Iconic

ITV - All In

Fox - Do You Believe? Anything can happen on home soil

Alcohol

Brahma

Michelob - The Superior Match

Quilmes - Two in a Row

Heineken - Fan Volunteers

Coors - Coooooorssssss!!!!

Castle Lager - The fans that stood the test of time

Stella - Celebration

Budweiser - Let It Pour

Jim Beam - Home Field Advantage

Tennents - Time to Dream

Johnnie Walker Brazil - 24 year Brazil Whisky

Retail

Dicks’s Sporting Goods - Where it all kicks off

Lego - Everyone wants a piece

Home Depot - We all have a name

Energy / soft drinks

Powerade - Power Your Fate

Pepsi - Home of football banter

Coca-Cola - No Better Feeling

Coca-Cola - Uncanned Emotions

IRN-BRU - We are made in Scotland from Girders

CPG

Unilever - Smell your best when you look your worst

Duracell - x Messi Reboot

Motors

Hyundai - Next Starts Now

Volkswagen Brazil - The Dream

Travel

Turo - How You Get There

Food

McDonalds - World Cup Cups

Lays - Bandwagon

Flamin Hot - The Warmest Welcome

Delivery

Deliveroo - Football Just Got Even Better

Uber Eats - Who could cook at a time like this?

Doordash - Deliver Us Football

Fashion

Burberry - A Good Sport

Finance

Visa - Everything is a Tap In

Each Thursday I’ll be looking at these across 3 macro clusters covering:

Sports Fandom, Culture and Experience

How people watch, follow, express, access and emotionally connect with sport across fan behaviour, culture, media, retail and live experiences.

Athlete Empowerment, Performance and Innovation

How athletes, teams and talent systems are being shaped by performance demands, technology, workload, wellbeing and empowerment.

Sports Growth, Power and Society Impact

How sport grows, who shapes it, and how it impacts communities, politics, participation, public value and wider society.

These micro signals and things of interest that are spotted will form larger research and trend reports on Vivrant in the weeks and months to come, looking at the bigger picture and what they mean for how sport is watched, played and experienced.

On to this week’s edition, which given it’s out the day a certain global football tournament that has already been causing much controversy begins, will lean heavily on the football side but will be more balanced in future and still contains signals from the world of basketball, cricket, Formula 1 and card collectables.

Themes in this cluster include the Fan Experience | Future of Fandom | Cultural Crossover | Retail as Connection

Football without fans to exploit is nothing

This week I covered how fans give the World Cup meaning and shape the story, despite FIFA’s best efforts to make the tournament inaccessible through extortionate ticket prices. It seems FIFA’s aim to extort as much money out of fans as possible knows no bounds, with the news they’ll charge $79 for a stadium shout out on the big screens. FIFA also wants your data as well and are encouraging match attendees to pick up a Fan ID card that they can then link to and enjoy exclusive content, unforgettable experiences and memories.

Fresh injection into the football x fashion category

I’ve written about the football shirts role as a fashion grails before and the how they’ve impacted wider fashion & streetwear culture as well as being influenced by it. It’s now become such an established product move for sportswear, streetwear and fashion brands to work together and have mutual influence that this sub-category can feel samey, but Nike have kicked new energy into things ahead of the World Cup. By partnering with a well known fashion or streetwear brand in each featured nation, they’ve elevated what would easily be overlooked functional pre-match wear to create looks that rival some of their actual match shirts. In France, it’s with Jacquemus, Canada it’s Nocta, in the Netherlands it’s Patta, the USA have dipped into the Virgil Abloh archives and in England we have Palace Skateboards. My favourite might be for a team that didn’t qualify for the big tournament, with Slawn’s work for Nigeria. The roll out of pre-game tracksuits, shirts and other fits for their World Cup team rosters happened in the recent World Cup warm-up games and they look great.

adidas have heavy kit presence at the tournament as well as being one of the main sponsors and they went extra hard on their kit launches this year with elaborate launches and bringing back the trefoil for the aways. Most best kit lists have multiple adidas entries in the top five and while the focus has been on the match kits, they’ve also dropped some heat with collaborators. See the Thrasher link up with Argentina and Kith for the blue and white’s captain and game’s GOAT Lionel Messi. They’ve also released a third kit with social enterprise Someone Somewhere, which has split opinions on it’s production methods.

Every brand that has any sort of relationship with or love of football has been releasing football related wears for an alternative look to rocking a current or retro team jersey. Highlights come from Corteiz, Drama Call and About:Blank.

You thought the World Cup was expensive

Ticket prices at the World Cup are high, but not New York Knicks in their first NBA Finals since 1999 high. The final’s rematch against the San Antonio Spurs has been close and entertaining, with resale tickets for the highest sections reaching over $7,000 a ticket while closer to the court has fetched over $100k in some instances. To sit in celeb row, an auction for two tickets raised over $1 million for the Garden of Dreams Foundation - the highest single donation ever received.

Ultra’s inspire NBA atmosphere initiative

The NBA wants to launch in Europe and a San Antonio fan club founded by their French superstar Victor Wembanyama, called The Jackals, are bringing a European football atmosphere to the NBA finals with chants and tifos. Wembanyama drew inspiration from the ultras of Paris Saint-Germain, who he admired while growing up in France. The NBA Commissioner Adam Silver is hopeful an NBA League will begin in 2027 with final bids for permanent franchises due by the end of this month and awards expected as soon as autumn. I previously wrote about this here and will be following up soon.

Live selling is a new commercial frontier in sports card selling

The biggest live-selling businesses in the trading card category are estimated to be generating $100 million or more per year in revenue through box breaks and live selling. It’s helping a hobby turned profession scale to new heights, bringing a layer of performance, while also raising issues over trust and market integrity.

Entertainment crossovers

Stepping outside of sport to reach new audiences and gain cultural relevance is a go to tactic for growth and both F1 and Cricket have announced interesting partnerships lately. In recent years, Formula 1 has seen a huge surge in growth with younger fans and data shows that more than four million children aged 8-12 now actively follow the sport, so announcing a deal with Disney where Mickey & Friends will be across F1 experiences, content and merchandise feels a natural fit. While not as big in scale as a full blown merchandise and experience ecosystem, as part of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup and in partnership with Sky Sports, the West End and Broadway global musical Wicked will perform as the opening performance at the tournament’s first match in Birmingham on 12 June.

Themes in this cluster include Player Empowerment | Athlete Overload | The Optimised Athlete

Lebron is TIME Magazine’s athlete of the century

LeBron James is named by TIME as the defining model of the modern athlete. Some one who is not just an elite performer, but a businessman, cultural figure, political voice and power broker. I’ll alway put Michael Jordan as my GOAT personally, but I’m a big Lebron fan and he’s paved the way for many athletes to show they’re more than just an athlete and don’t need to just ‘stick to sports’. He’s showed a player can build companies, use their platform politically, create opportunities for friends and partners, invest in media, tech and community projects, and still remain at the top of the game. Combine Lebron’s playing peak, longevity and off-court influence, few athletes come close and he epitomises the player empowerment and player-led media movements I love to talk about and will feature heavily at Vivrant.

NIL is reducing the number of players declaring for the NBA Draft

When Name, Image, Likeness was passed so college athletes could finally generate revenue that used to only be for their colleges, it was seen as a win for athletes but uncharted territories for what other impact it would have. One area we can see big impact on now is the number of college basketball players declaring for the NBA Draft dropping. Since the bill passed in 2021, the first season of NIL had 353 players declare early-entry. In April this year, that number dropped to 71, a 79% reduction which then saw a further decline with 38 players subsequently withdrawing. With the money now on offer to college athletes through their own brand deals and revenue sharing with the colleges, the opportunity is there to earn more money than a late first round pick could. Braylon Mullins, a very likely first round pick this year, decided to return to UConn. “I think the world has changed. There’s not this pressure to go to the NBA now because of the money situation [due to NIL]. Players like Braylon are probably, he would probably make more money at UConn next year than he would if he were the No. 15 pick [at the NBA draft],” his head coach Dan Hurley told The Athletic. More returning players is making the college game stronger and creating more household names than the one year and done era. There is still a risk to injury, drops in performance or other hurdles that could impact a draft position by staying in college longer, but it may also help players where another year in college is more beneficial to their longer term pro prospects and now they have a financial reason to stay instead of a potentially too early jump.

Something that also has an interesting knock on effect, the prom NIL era. The high school rite of passage has turned into into a cultural phenomenon, part victory lap and part personal branding opportunity.

Pat Mcafee to double his ESPN salary

One of the big stars in sports media and key driver of the player led media era is inline for another big payday as ESPN look to increase their deal with the former Indianapolis Colts punter Pat Mcafee from $30 million a year to $60 million.

Themes in this cluster include Sports Growth | Participation & Community Sport | Society Impact | Sports Politics

All the risk, for FIFA’s rewards

Not everyone wants the World Cup on their doorstep and the Chicago mayor, Rahm Emanuel, revealed why he turned down the opportunity to host games in the city. FIFA are expected to make $11 billion from the tournament, with cities being asked to take on all the risk, while FIFA takes home the rewards.

School cancelled for football

I always dreamed of days like that when I was at school, but it’s actually happening in Mexico City to ease traffic for the host’s opener against South Africa at the Estadio Azteca, alongside workers being asked to work from home.

ICC Women’s World Cup set to be the biggest

With around 200,000 tickets sold already, the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup is set to be the biggest yet with record-breaking figures achieved before the tournament has even begun and comfortably eclipsing previous ICC Women’s T20 World Cup benchmarks for tournament which begins in England tomorrow, 12th June. A launch with all 12 captains in attendance too place under London’s famous Waterloo Bridge, transformed into a massive cricket pitch for the first time.

A landmark signing for the WSL, but the game needs to move from visibility to viability

London City Lionesses rise has been remarkable, if not without it’s controversy and this week they made another big step to shaking up the WSL by signing one of the best players in the world, Alexia Putellas, with Mary Earps reportedly already signed. The team, owned by American businesswoman Michele Kang has just finished its debut season in the top flight and as its only independent, is looking to make major moves in the game. While London City is one of the game’s examples of the popularity and growth in the game, a recently released report suggests the women’s game is at a crucial point.

The Cutback has some of the best writing on football on the internet and what they do for women’s football coverage is outstanding. They’ve recently released a definitive free-to-read report on the present and future of women’s football which outlines why visibility isn’t the issue, but viability is with attendance retention one of the key barriers to overcome. An informative document which reads as a state of the nation address, as well as providing a blueprint for the key next phase in women’s football.

Li-Ning look set to make a big US retail push with Steph Curry deal

Chinese sports brand L-Ning and Anta have been making moves the last few years to sign NBA stars with the sport very popular in China. The latter signed Kyrie Irving after he left Nike under controversial circumstances and his popular Kai silo has helped make waves in basketball. Li-Ning have a steady roster of credible NBA players and both brands would like to grow their presence not just in basketball, but in the US retail arena. Li-Ning may have just made the signing that will open the doors to that with a major move in partnering with arguably the greatest shooter of all time in Steph Curry, to a ten year deal. Curry caused a big shock when he parted ways with Under Armour last year and was able to take his Curry brand with him. For the rest of the season we got to see arguably the greatest sneaker free agent run with Curry wearing a variety of current and classic franchises and silos across all the current major and once beloved brands. The excellent sports, fashion and culture writer Daniel-Yaw Miller has a great breakdown on why the move happened on SportsVerse.

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In today’s article I outline what makes the tournament special, through where it’s experienced and how the story and narratives take shape.

Communal moments

Tournaments have always been a communal experience. Watching in our homes, around friends, in pubs, at watch parties or fan parks and public viewing spaces is how most of us will experience the tournament.

At home you’ll have different generations debating why their era was better, but united in their nation’s support. Around friends you’ll debate the GOAT and team selection while everyone plays to their roles in the group watch dynamic from host to who ends up bringing the most beer.

Down the pub, bar or coffee house you’ll connect with people whose name you won’t know or remember, but embrace during the times of euphoria and despair.

Watch parties and fan gatherings have evolved into cultural events in their own right from wild scenes in Croydon Boxpark in the UK to public square celebrations across capital cities. Who can forget the mass street parties in Buenos Aires when Argentina won the World Cup during their nation’s summer?

Cultural & societal rituals and routines form the structure for how fandom is expressed so from one country to another, things can look similar in some comparisons and widely different to others. The experience in the UK, Germany, Australia and France can feel very similar for example. Images of pubs, bars, beer gardens and pints in hand. In Saudi Arabia and Qatar, the social architecture of football looks different. The match is still public, emotional and collective, but it often happens through cafes and restaurants.

Emotional bonds and escapism

A tournament’s communal moments create a shared emotional release that turns fandom into something bigger. Club loyalties, political persuasion and whatever is going on in your life at this moment gets put aside as it feels like nearly everyone is going through the country’s tournament ebbs and flows together.

Your colleague at work who you thought didn’t like football, is suddenly caught up in the energy only an international tournament can bring. Speaking of work, good luck to anyone that gets anything done during the tournament.

It doesn’t mean football is more important than whatever is going on in your life, nor can it take precedence over some truly awful things happening in the world right now, some of which one of the tournament host’s presidents is presiding over. Football has always been the most important of the least important things in life.

Football has always provided a mode of escapism. Football has always offered an outlet for someone to express identity and find belonging. In a world of increasing loneliness, the belonging that football can provide and in particular when it’s at a national level during a tournament, can only be a welcoming thing, even if it’s just for a few weeks or simply the 90 minutes.

Timezones test commitment and dictate the modes of engagement

World Cup’s always provide a test of stamina and support depending on how the host nation(s) time difference impacts you. Late night and early morning games may disrupt the tried and tested social norms, but they also create different ways to watch, stay engaged and follow the tournament.

I can always remember staying up late to watch Italy’s games at USA 94 as I was obsessed with Roberto Baggio. While the World Cup in Japan and South Korea in 2002 meant a final England group game happening while sitting a college exam and a memorable club night turned into breakfast at the local pub for England vs Brazil. The lack of sleep felt worth it when Michael Owen scored the opener, less so when David Seaman flapped at Ronaldinho’s cross-shot.

A North America World Cup will see late-night viewing in Europe and Africa to early-morning matches in Asia. Games will be competing with work, school and sleep which will see catch up media, highlights and social conversation come into its own to stay informed.

The 90 minutes fuels the content eco-system

Sport is the last monoculture that brings people together for those you had to be there euphoric moments, that have to be experienced in real time for the most optimum feeling.

The match is still the main event for the majority of fans and it feeds an eco-system of reaction, analysis and perspective where fans get to delve into a feast of football content. For some fans, the match is simply raw material feeding the short-form ecosystem: highlights to stay updated, edits, remixes and reactions to reshape the story in real time.

Many will follow the World Cup without watching much or any of the 90 minutes. Sometimes timezones will dictate that, while for others it’s just how they engage with the game as they flip between platforms constantly, consuming what feels relevant in the moment.

Multiplatform experience

WARC Media projects the tournament will inject $10.5B into the global ad market, which is less than in Russia 2018 where a $12.6B boost was generated. What’s changing is the evolution in attention from a linear broadcast and captive audiences to multi-platform experiences and audiences who are participating, creating and engaging in the feeds and comments sections.

Fans are no longer just watching games, they are co-creating its narrative in real time. Fans will be creating edits, reactions and storytelling formats that shape how the tournament is experienced.

The big brands will still be present across the linear broadcasts and the hydration ad breaks during games, but increasing brand focus is chasing the fragmented audience attention. The mico-moments outside of the 90 minutes in-between games where anticipation and reaction is shared and lived through has always been an important facet of a fans tournament experience.

The traditional broadcasters play their role as the ones showing the games but the rising independent media class like Versus, Copa90, The Rest is Football and Men In Blazers will be the ones that become the go to for the moments in between.

The Creator-led World Cup

Back in 2022, I don’t remember the term creator being used much. YouTubers and Influencers were the names of the people who helped provide an alternative look at the World Cup away from the traditional broadcasters and media. Now that term and industry around it has exploded and it feels like the story and narratives of the World Cup will be heavily told this way, making this the creator led World Cup.

Creators will shape how fans watch, feel and follow the tournament acting as daily storytellers, cultural interpreters and emotional anchors. Creators now hold such influence that 44% of fans say they’d choose a creator over an official broadcast or watch both together (Rising Ballers FWC Heartbeats Report).

TikTok have partnered with FIFA to bring 30 global Creator Correspondents who will provide behind-the-scenes access and storytelling throughout the tournament. DAZN ran a competition for people to nominate their favourite creators per qualified team to bring fan-led perspectives.

We’ve already had a pre-tournament creator led story show their influence, by raising the awareness of New Zealand’s Tim Payne. Argentine creator El Scarso galvanised his followers to put the spotlight on a lesser known and followed player, now Payne has gone from 5,000 followers to over 5 million, becoming a global sensation.

One aspect of content I’ve been enjoying so far is the story of the host cities told through its culture, whether its OnlyScrans showing us the best places to eat or MattyFC exploring the respective football scenes. It’s these stories that fans want to consume and seems a missed opportunity by brands who could have partnered with creators or created their own host city based content.

Football is nothing without the fans

This World Cup may go down as the most commercialised of all time, with real issues in how FIFA and one of the hosts have handled how it comes to life. This can’t be forgotten but it also should not take away from how World Cups bring people together and how they’re experienced in all their facets around the world. This World Cup will be as emotive as ever and the biggest expression of fandom on a global stage that we’ve ever seen.

Over the last few weeks plenty of brands have been rolling out their big World Cup creative and campaigns. There’s been a lot of David Beckham, the classic adidas vs Nike talk on LinkedIn, plus the usual mix of football inspiration and achievement cliches covered.

Next Friday, I’ll be publishing a deep dive into the World Cup work that has been rolled out so far, which will be the first of my weekly sports marketing creative work round-ups. Each Friday we’ll look at the content, campaigns and activations that have caught our eye so if you haven’t subscribed yet, please do.

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For today’s article, I wanted to take a look at the narratives, moments & things to watch that will come to life at the World Cup and from a marketing perspective, it might give an indication to how brands show up, while it might also offer some last minute content ideas.

Let’s address the elephant in the room straight from kick-off…

We can’t just stick to football

It’s too naive to think football and politics can live separately anymore and this World Cup is going to make it harder to escape from. Due to the USA-Iran conflict, we have one nation being bombed by a host, whose president was given the dubious FIFA peace prize. Add in the travesty that is the terror ICE have been causing people and how a number of teams that have qualified will struggle to have support from their fans as they’re on banned lists, it’s going to make for a controversial and uncomfortable backdrop. There was an unease over the Russia and Qatar World Cups that soon went away once the football started, but it doesn’t feel like that’s going to be the case this time.

Host cities become cultural stages

The 2026 FIFA World Cup will be defined not just by what happens on the pitch, but by its 16 host cities across the United States, Canada and Mexico. Each location shapes how fans experience the tournament and the diversity of the host cities each offer a distinct identity: from Atlanta’s hip-hop scene to Guadalajara’s tequila and mariachi heritage, Kansas City’s bbq culture to Toronto’s multicultural energy. I’m hoping we’ll see plenty of brands on the ground combine the football with the host city’s cultural offering for fans, as the tournament becomes a series of localised cultural moments, where the experience extends far beyond the stadium into food, music, nightlife and neighbourhood life.

Expensive ticket prices, who is football for?

Going to watch sport in person is increasingly becoming a luxury, as ticket costs continue to spiral out of control. The way FIFA have priced and run the ticket buying process for this World Cup and excuses to try to justify it is a further indictment of their greed, but also narrows the net of who actually gets to watch football. USA has yet to sell out its opening game against Paraguay. Could we see empty seats or less atmosphere as the real fans that create it are priced out for a more corporate hospitality type of fan more focused on selfies and champagne? Plenty of tickets are still available so can brands step in here to buy them on behalf of fans and ensure the tournament is for everyone?

Layered Fandom

National-team loyalty is no longer simple. Fans support where they were born, where they live, and where their families come from to create layered, multi-team identities. Across the USA, Canada and Mexico, 74% of fans support more than one nation, 12% above the global average. The most football-passionate demographic in the USA will be Hispanic-Americans. This is one of the many interest facets of fandom and is a story that should be told more frequently and widely.

Hydration breaks: player welfare dressed up as a revenue grab?

FIFA have mandated hydration breaks at 22 minutes in each half at every game to protect the players from the heat. The announcement was made at a World Cup broadcasters forum, where FIFA announced commercial broadcasters could sell advertising within this 3 minute break. This will change the viewing experience as a load of ads breaks the play, but something going under the radar is how this impacts the game, when we’re essentially now playing football across 4 quarters, like in the NBA or NFL. This has the potential to kill one team’s momentum in games, while also offering new tactical opportunities for coaches as if it was a time out.

American Sports Crossover

Football’s influence now extends into elite US sports, where athletes are actively engaging with and drawing inspiration from the game. From the NBA to the NFL, football has become a shared cultural reference point shaping playing style, identity and fandom. Players like Lebron James, Kevin Durant and Giannis Antetokounmpo have invested in clubs, while Joel Embiid and Victor Wembanyama have spoken about its influence on their play. The NBA finals are on as the tournament starts so the overlap will become more visible than ever.

All the football, all the time

Can you have too much football? This tournament might push that theory to the limit. By adding 16 more teams we’ll see the number of games increase by 62% to 104. It used to take 64 games to crown a World Champion, now it will take 72 games for the group stage to eliminate 16. To win the World Cup you’ll now need to play 8 games, as there is an additional round of 32 that needs to be won.

Expanded tournament means discoveries and new stars

While I do think 48 teams is way too much for a World Cup, it does mean we’ll get to see teams on the world stage for the first time, which means new discoveries from players to fan rituals. I think back to how Jamaica in 1998 and Senegal in 2002 captured the world’s attention through their play, style and fan culture. Teams like Cape Verde or Curaçao could be those teams in 26. I’ve already got a soft spot for Curaçao based on their amazing adidas away kit alone.

Ronaldo vs Messi legacy

Two of the greatest players of all time, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are very likely playing in their last World Cup unless there’s some sort of Tom Brady longevity thing about to happen. From rivals to now respected friends appearing in ad campaigns together, both will grace the world stage for a record sixth time as the biggest names in the sport, even if they’re not gracing the best leagues in the world anymore. It will likely be another chance for the adidas vs Nike chat to flood the feed and both brands will be celebrating their final game at this tournament.

The next wave ready to make their mark

With Messi and Ronaldo expected to play in their last World Cup, it’s time for the next wave to take over. Stars expected to shine include Lamine Yamai, Kenan Yıldız, Désiré Doué, Gilberto Mora and Ibrahim Mbaye, but there’s always a player or two that comes from nowhere to let the world know their time is now.

USA and Canada’s football evolution

Mexico has had a rich football culture for a long time, their credentials are not in doubt. For the USA and Canada the tournament is a chance for both nations to show the world how their respective football cultures are evolving. The USA has come a long way since that infamous Diana Ross penalty miss when hosting the 1994 World Cup. The MLS hadn’t started then but now has 30 teams and a growing infrastructure beneath it, where teams from Inter Miami to Portland Hearts of Pine are creating their own supporter culture. Canada’s national team success is helping turn it from a niche sport to one growing in popularity as fans get behind the local teams in the developing Premier League.

Final Thought

What happens on the pitch at the World Cup creates the over-arching storylines and naturally impacts the mood and investment in your team or teams depending on their progression. They’re are also about so much more beyond the pitch.

From the celebration of different fan cultures around the world, to how the tournament’s are experienced across the respective nations at home, on the go, in social third spaces and beyond. The outlets and people that provide the daily updates and the places that facilitate the fan conversation. It’s these micro-moments and coming together that makes a World Cup special and always the biggest opportunity for brands, official sponsor or not. As the tournament takes shape, we’ll get to see which brands are just jumping into the World Cup because it’s where the attention is, or are involved to facilitate, enable and contribute to how fan’s experience the tournament.