DAZN enters French market with live Ligue 1 coverage

DAZN Group has launched in France with access to Ligue 1 Uber Eats matches via the Canal+ Ligue 1 channel after agreeing a strategic and exclusive distribution partnership with France’s major premium pay TV operator, Canal+.  

DAZN’s launch in France is another step in the company’s growth strategy, providing access to one of the world’s biggest media markets, and an increasingly digitally connected set of consumers. France will be DAZN’s seventh key European market in which it has a significant domestic presence, and eleventh globally as it seeks to further grow its total user-base upwards from 60 million.  

DAZN’s French subscribers will be able to access excellent content in the form of Ligue 1 football, the top two matches per week throughout the season on Canal+ Ligue 1, without having to subscribe to any other service. Additionally, as the NFL’s global partner, customers will have the option to add NFL Game Pass – the only way to access every single NFL game, including the play-offs and Super Bowl – to their subscription package.  

ustomers will also be able to access DAZN via app purchases on mobiles, Smart TVs and other devices. The DAZN app will be available within the myCanal service over time, and DAZN will be announcing other local distribution deals in due course. 

DAZN is also launching a linear channel, DAZN 1, which will be bundled with Canal+, reaching 1.2 million subscribers, and will provide access to quality content such as UEFA Women’s Champions League, the Belgian Juliper Pro League, and the best boxing and combat match ups. Canal+ will also deliver a significant marketing partnership to drive awareness of DAZN, its content, products and services. 

DAZN Group CEO, Shay Segev, said, “DAZN is incredibly excited to launch in France, especially being able to bring Ligue 1 Uber Eats matches via Canal+ Ligue 1 directly to our customers. The French market is one we have been looking at for a while as we believe there is huge potential for DAZN’s content, products and services in such a well-developed media and digital economy.

“As well as delivering DAZN’s top-quality content, including the top two Ligue 1 matches every week, through our localised app, we will offer have a linear channel, DAZN 1, as part of our deal with Canal+.  This is the beginning of a long-term relationship with French sports fans, as we look to build the ultimate sports entertainment platform, and secure more distribution deals.” 

Member Insights: How MLB is using digital to bring baseball to Europe

For this week’s Member Insight piece David Granger, Content Director at Cinch, speaks to the Managing Director of MLB Europe about getting baseball to the UK and trying to get fans to love it.

Getting major league baseball to the UK might seem an unenviable task, but for those lucky enough to go to the London Stadium over a scorching weekend in June, it is worth their efforts.

As well as three hours of top-level sporting action, for the non-fanatics there is a host of entertainment: nine innings is not the only show on offer. There are T-shirt cannons, an off-the-scale good live band, in-game fan contests, that Wurlitzer organ punctuating the action and – a stroke of genius – the very English mascots’ race. As well as the outsized hotdogs and beer in baseball bat-shaped glasses.

Heading up bringing baseball to this side of the Atlantic is the managing director of MLB Europe, Ben Ladkin. Previously part of the Arsenal media group, overseeing its digital and social platforms, he joined the MLB in 2019.

A lot of time and effort went into bringing the teams and giving West Ham’s home ground a make-over, so what is the intention for MLB Europe?

“We’re concentrating on building an audience over the next few years,” said Ben. “And then, of course, building a business. But you can’t have a business without the audience.

“These UK games are an incredible way of giving people the experience of watching baseball in a ballpark right in front of you on a summer’s evening.”

That experience is one which has is not only for European-based fanatics from the UK, France, Germany, Holland to get their once-a-year fix, but travelling US fans as well.

“We had good responses from Chicago and St. Louis fans who came. The Chicago Cubs hired a pub for the occasion and we had fans at our fan festival in Trafalgar Square. For them, seeing their team play in England, in a full London Stadium with a fantastic atmosphere is an amazing experience.”

One clever aspect is to take the best traditions of the US game and build unique London ones. Singing Sweet Caroline is a Red Sox tradition, but with the Neil Diamond song’s popularity in the UK, it works here. As did the mascot race which pitted Freddie Mercury, Winston Churchill, King Henry VIII, and a member of the King’s Guard racing around the field in the sweltering heat.

But has it all been fun and baseball games? Bringing a US sport over here is not without its hurdles. A baseball field doesn’t easily fit into a soccer stadium (it’s slightly bigger), so seats have to be moved and the logistics of finding time to get two teams over in the densely packed season was tricky. The teams played in the US on the Wednesday, flew Thursday, practised on Friday, played Saturday and Sunday, flew back that night to play again on the Tuesday. 

Is there anything else that’s tailored to the British audience?

“You want to give an authentic experience. We want people watching the game as they would in a US ballparks – we don’t want to change that,” said Ben. “One of the barriers with baseball is the perception it’s a complex game, you can really get into the weeds of the stats and how it works. 

“But actually, it’s a fairly simple game – you don’t want to dumb anything down for the audience, but we take opportunities to try to make it obvious what is going on for newcomers.”

One of the ways to do this is using digital and social as a way in. When Ben started in 2019, Covid put paid to the 2020 game, so the team used that unwanted chance to look again at its online output.

“We revisited our digital strategy, to build a fan base – and digital is key to that. Rather than liking baseball for one weekend, people can do it for the whole season.” 

Getting the balance right between pleasing new fans without patronising the experts has been done through understanding the needs and knowledge of both audiences: 

“We’ve worked hard on that digital piece. Firstly changing day-to-day content, to make sure we’re providing something that’s different from the US channels which do an amazing job of covering all the seasons and all of the team channels, but it is very in-depth. 

“We create a slightly digested view which avid fans can appreciate, but, if you land on our channels, you won’t be overwhelmed by the 15 games played last night.”

Supplementing sport coverage is a variety of entertainment, influencers and online content from current cricket star Harry Brook hitting balls to chefs travelling to Chicago and St Louis to sample the fare and bring it back to cook at the UK games.

“We’re showing the sport is good fun, easy to get into as well as finding potential audiences,” said Ben. “In the traditional audience funnel, it’s at the very top – doing a whole load of activity which shows baseball as fun, entertaining and easy to enjoy. As people come down that funnel you make sure those next touch points don’t scare them off. You see an amazing catch, or you see the highlights and you can follow the sport easily.”

Interestingly the avid fans have been on hand, via social, to help newcomers understand – answering their questions and welcoming them. And that inclusive camaraderie/friendly rivalry was evident at the game in June.

But for MLB Europe, it’s not one big event each year, it’s building a legacy for the domestic game. 

“We want to put in long-term roots for the sport. The UK redevelopment agency has worked closely with the US on First Pitch, a schools programme. We want to empower those people who are in the sport and are enthusiastic about it growing. 

“The MLB games get everyone excited, but we want to make sure we are building this in the right way. As well as the digital content, which we’re really proud of, we work at a domestic level to bring the sport up and get people interested. Because the more people playing, the better.”

Credit: Wendell Cruz-USA TODAY Sports

FIBA’s Courtside 1891 platform available in NBA App and NBA.com for FIBA World Cup

The National Basketball Association (NBA) and the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) today announced that the NBA App and NBA.com will carry FIBA’s digital platform, Courtside 1891, allowing fans in 20 countries and territories to purchase the FIBA World Cup Pass and watch the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023.*

Beginning with the opening games on Friday, August 25, and continuing through to the Final on Sunday, September 10, Courtside 1891’s FIBA World Cup Pass will offer fans access to live and on-demand games, extended highlights and top plays.  The addition of the FIBA World Cup Pass into NBA App programming builds on the NBA’s efforts to engage with fans throughout the offseason and widen its scope of basketball content. 

Taking place in the Philippines, Japan and Indonesia, the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 will feature 32 participating teams playing in 92 games over 16 days of competition. On August 25, 2022-23 Kia All-NBA First Team member Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (Oklahoma City Thunder) and the Canada men’s National Team will open the Group Phase play against France, led by three-time NBA All-Star and Kia NBA Defensive Player of the Year Rudy Gobert (Minnesota Timberwolves).

On Saturday, August 26, Slovenia, led by four-time NBA All-Star and Kia All-NBA First Team member Luka Doncic (Dallas Mavericks), will begin Group Phase play against Venezuela. The USA men’s National Team, which features 2023 NBA All-Stars Anthony Edwards (Timberwolves), Tyrese Haliburton (Indiana Pacers) and Jaren Jackson Jr. (Memphis Grizzlies), as well as 2022-23 Kia NBA Rookie of the Year Paolo Banchero (Orlando Magic), will open Group Phase play against New Zealand. Defending world champion Spain will tip off its title defense against Cote d’Ivoire on August 26 also. 

The NBA will announce the complete list of NBA players participating in the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 once all final national team rosters are set.

Courtside 1891’s FIBA World Cup Pass is available for purchase at NBA.com/WorldCup, and the complete game schedule is available at NBA.com/fiba/world-cup/2023/schedule.

The coverage available on Courtside 1891 complements the extensive live broadcasts that will be made by FIBA’s broadcast partners in over 190 territories across the world. Fans will be able to follow both live telecasts and dedicated analysis through their national broadcast partner, with the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 on track to have the biggest and broadest distribution ever. Up to date details of local broadcast distribution arrangements will be made available on the official FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 website.

MLS sees Brand Health scores soar thanks to Apple TV deal and arrival of Messi

For this week’s Brand Health Index powered by YouGov, we are turning our attention to the MLS. Since the arrival of the great Lionel Messi, the league is back on our radar.

Messi has sprinkled some serious stardust on the league and clips of his various goals and assists have gone viral.

Inter Miami’s game against Dallas FC in the Leagues Cup sold out in just ten minutes and the second-hand market ticket saw tickets being sold for as much as $20,000. Last week we covered the demand for Messi jerseys that has swept across the States.

Inter Miami managing owner Jorge Mas has said that the club’s revenues are expected to double over the next year.

Away from Inter Miami, 25 of the 28 teams have seen their Brand Health score increase in the past year. The biggest winners are New York City FC, Los Angeles FC and Inter Miami CF. 

All three are in some of the biggest markets that the US has to offer and places that are always going to be appealing to some of sport’s biggest stars.

We are in the first season of the MLS’s ground-breaking media rights deal with Apple, worth $250 million a season, the partnership has given Apple exclusive rights for worldwide distribution for the next ten years. If Apple continues to increase its portfolio of sports properties it will only benefit the MLS because it will be easily accessible to more viewers.

The three losers are Houston Dynamo, Columbus Crew and the Montreal Impact. The Dynamo and Crew have both seen a decrease of rating of 0.4 and the Impact have decreased by 0.1.

Check out the rest of the index below

The House View: Premier League’s return signals the start of football’s domination

The Premier League is back this weekend and it has been all of (checks calendar) 75 days since last season’s conclusion.

I will be honest at that point, I was ready for the football season to be over and, thanks to a World Cup dropped into the middle, it did feel like a particularly long one. So am I excited for a new season, so soon after the end of the last? Of course I am, I can’t wait. Having my stress levels dictated by 22 blokes (plus five off the bench) chasing a ball around is truly one of my favourite things.

Football has a grasp on the nation like nothing else, and with the summer’s other big sporting events already out of the way, our attention collectively turns back to football. A gripping Ashes series and a historic Wimbledon Men’s final both piqued sports fans’ interests at times but football is back and as usual it will take over. 

What fascinates me is the comparison between sporting fandom over here and across the pond in the US. We have had several American interns working for us this summer and it has been really interesting to observe the way their fandom is structured. 

They all support NFL teams, NBA teams and MLB teams, then some have NHL teams as well. You then have college sports which is something, as a recent university graduate, I can’t quite get my head around. Of course I wanted my university to do well when it came to sports but I barely attended a fixture. The average college American football game was watched by 41,480 in 2022. That is mad. To put it into perspective, the average attendance of a Premier League fixture for last season was just 40,267. 

Almost every major city in the US has NFL, MLB and NBA franchises. In Philadelphia, they all share the same parking lot in some odd three-part cathedral to sport. Seriously, it is amazing. 

Over here, at least outside London, it is very hard to find cities with elite teams in multiple of different sports. Leicester has its football team, the Leicester Tigers and a small county cricket ground. Birmingham has a few football teams and an international cricket ground but little else. Manchester has two Premier League teams, an international cricket ground and a rugby union team. 

This really emphasises football’s stranglehold on this country and, if we are honest, the vast majority of Europe. It dominates the sports pages and nothing, and I really mean nothing, drives website traffic like football transfer stories. 

So strap yourselves in over the next eight or nine months the Premier League and football in general will dominate the sports fan’s agenda in the UK. And it is going to be brilliant.

By Alex Brinton, Content Manager iSportConnect

Burnley confirm investment from Dude Perfect

Dude Perfect, the leading sports and entertainment group, have today confirmed their investment in Burnley Football Club, as the Clarets prepare for their Premier League return in 2023/24.

The group, made up of Garrett Hilbert, Tyler Toney, Cody Jones and Coby and Cory Cotton, will formalise their involvement in the Club’s ownership group, having been revealed earlier this month as the official shirt partner for 2023/24 junior retail shirts and academy teams.

Since meeting at Texas A&M University, Dude Perfect have gone on to amass over 59 million YouTube subscribers and almost 16 billion YouTube views since launching their channel 14 years ago.

Speaking about their investment in Burnley, which follows the news earlier this year that ex-NFL star JJ Watt and his wife, former USWNT player Kealia were joining the Clarets family, Garrett Hilbert from Dude Perfect said:

“We’ve been fans of the Premier League for some time, so we’re excited to formalise the relationship with Burnley and hopefully help to introduce a bunch of younger fans to the club.

“What Vincent and the guys achieved last year was incredible and it’s a really exciting time to be a Burnley fan. We also spoke to JJ multiple times and his passion and ideas for how we can help grow to the club and create Burnley fans for life really excited us – we’re planning to be in town for the Manchester City game this month and we can’t wait to meet everyone.”

Alan Pace, Chairman of Burnley FC, added:

“We’re delighted to formally welcome Dude Perfect into the Clarets family and this is another exciting step on our journey as we prepare for the 2023/24 season. The guys have shown a huge interest and passion in the club, its history and our community. I’m excited by the opportunities that this partnership will bring as we continue to attract new fans and showcase the Burnley brand to a global audience.”

ESPN announces agreement with PENN Entertainment to launch ESPN BET

ESPN today announced an agreement with PENN Entertainment to launch ESPN BET, a branded sportsbook for fans in the United States. PENN Entertainment will rebrand its current sportsbook and relaunch as ESPN BET, effective this Fall in the 16 legalized betting states where PENN Entertainment is licensed. The rebrand includes the mobile app, website, and mobile website.

ESPN BET furthers ESPN’s commitment to serve fans by leveraging ESPN’s industry-leading multi-platform reach with the rising product operations and expertise of PENN Entertainment. ESPN BET will become ESPN’s exclusive sportsbook, and PENN Entertainment will receive odds attribution, promotional services inclusive of digital product integrations, traditional media and content integrations, and ESPN talent access, among other services that collectively generate maximum fan awareness of ESPN BET.

“Our primary focus is always to serve sports fans and we know they want both betting content and the ability to place bets with less friction from within our products,” said Jimmy Pitaro, Chairman, ESPN. “The strategy here is simple: to give fans what they’ve been requesting and expecting from ESPN. PENN Entertainment is the perfect partner to build an unmatched user experience for sports betting with ESPN BET.”

Jay Snowden, Chief Executive Officer and President, PENN Entertainment said: “This agreement with ESPN and collaboration on ESPN BET allows us to take another step forward as an industry leader. Together, we can utilize each other’s strengths to create the type of experience that existing and new bettors will expect from both companies, and we can’t wait to get started.”

Over recent years, ESPN has increased multi-platform sports betting content, adding digital programming, radio segments, and editorial coverage from talent. ESPN BET is now the latest offering from ESPN to meet fan demand for a trusted brand in the sports betting space. The ESPN BET brand will be home to ESPN’s sports betting content across platforms. 

In concert with PENN Entertainment’s comprehensive responsible gaming programming, ESPN will use its platforms to educate sports fans on responsible gaming, including but not limited to:

  • Continuing ESPN’s high standard of journalistic integrity when covering the sports betting space.
  • Developing an ESPN committee of responsible gaming, representative of a diverse cross-section of the business, to regularly review compliance, programming, and policies.
  • Implementing responsible marketing policies and guidelines to safeguard fans.
  • Working with industry experts on best practices and continual review of responsible gaming programming.

European Cricket Network announces partnership with Stake.com

The European Cricket Network is delighted to continue having Stake.com as one of the Official Partners of the prestigious European Cricket Championship (ECC) 2023, featuring 31 national teams from across Europe who will compete over four weeks of high-stakes cricket action for a chance to be crowned the kings of European cricket. The partnership includes significant branding across the international TV program graphics for Stake.com to a worldwide audience. The total viewership is expected to be in excess of 40m viewers per day.

The European Cricket Championship, recognized for its competitive spirit and remarkable cricketing prowess, is eager to collaborate once more with Stake.com. Together, they seek to engage fans globally and bring the sport’s passion to millions of cricket enthusiasts, enabling them to be a part of the action on and off the field.

Roger Feiner, CEO of the European Cricket League AG: “Based on the success of last year, European Cricket is excited to extend the cooperation with Stake.com, one of the most innovative and engaging companies within this sector, also for the European Cricket Championships 2023. With this engagement, European Cricket sits alongside other first-class sponsorships of Stake.com such as their partnerships with Premier League team Everton FC, Alfa Romeo F1 Team Stake and UFC.

Like Stake.com we are innovators and we believe there can be a lot of overlap between our companies when it comes to principles and best practices. We are particularly excited about our new evening matches for Stake.com that will be broadcast primetime into the cricket key markets.”

Dominic Rae, Sponsorship Manager of Stake.com: “We are delighted about securing our partnership with the European Cricket Championship for another year. With an increased number of national teams taking part, it promises to be an even better festival of cricket. We’re sure the tournament will be another resounding success for all involved.”

Meet the Member: “There is such a buzz around the club and that energy transcends all the different departments.”

Ahead of this Friday’s Premier League curtain-raiser between Burnley and Manchester City, we caught up with the newly-promoted side’s Head of Commercial, Marcus Mellor to speak about the energy around the club and the challenges around dealing with partnerships when you can’t be sure what league you will be in.

So Marcus to kick off, take us through your journey in sport?

My journey working in the business of sport began at TRM Partners, a boutique sponsorship sales agency. When I was there we worked as white label sales proposition for some premium rights holders such as Mercedes F1, UEFA and Cricket Australia. My role was based around research, analysing and understanding cohesive brands to approach on behalf of those particular rights holders. 

Following this, I went to work for a company called The Energy Check, I started there as a Partnerships Manager and then worked my way up to Head of Partnerships. At the company’s peak involvement in sport partnerships, we worked with over 40 rights holders, both in the US and the UK. My main role was to drive ROI through our relationships, different marketing campaigns and branding assets with multiple rights holders across a variety of sports.  

I then moved to work for Social Chain, becoming Head of Commercial Partnerships. This was a step outside of sport, with Social Chain being a company that focused on e-commerce, social commerce and media publishing as well as being a marketing agency; my role here involved developing relationships with brands in a slightly different way, as we would work on campaigns that focused on content delivery and traditional media metrics on socials (impressions, reach, engagements etc.). I worked with brands such as BT & EE, Ebay, Logitech and EPOS, focusing on content delivery and returns through ecommerce sales.

So essentially, all roads lead to Burnley… kind of! I thoroughly enjoyed my time at Social Chain but I always kept a keen eye on any relevant opportunities in sport. Being a football fan, I was aware of the waves Burnley were making, and meeting the management and ownership as part of the interview process only affirmed that, I knew I wanted to be part of the journey immediately! 

You have been at Burnley for 10 months now, talk to us a bit about your time at the club and what has surprised you the most?

Honestly, as cliche as it might sound, the first 10 months have been an absolute whirlwind and felt more like 10 days. I don’t think there have been many weeks where we haven’t announced something new and exciting, whether it be JJ & Kealia Watt’s involvement, Vincent extending his contract (amongst much PL interest), multiple partner announcements, promotion… the list goes on! 

We are actually a very young organisation in terms of the people we have, I like to describe us as a startup, with 140 years of history and it definitely feels that way in the office. Cliche again but we want to get 1% better everyday, growing fast and learning from our failures (which I have plenty to learn from). No day is the same at the moment and it really is an exciting time for the football club. 

The pace at which the club is moving is incredible and we have a plethora of amazing young talent in our ranks who are driving us forward every day. We have extremely ambitious owners and we are all bought into the ethos of evolving, we are making massive leaps forward in terms of establishing the club as an exciting brand in sport and football.

How has it been different to other roles you have held previously?

It is my first time working for a rightsholder in my career and it has been really interesting being this side of things. I think understanding the market and what brands are looking for from rights holders has probably been the biggest difference, everyday I seem to uncover something which may not have crossed my mind in my previous roles, I have really enjoyed that learning aspect.  

Fundamentally, there are a lot of similarities between what I do now and what I have done before which has put me in good stead. My position allows me to both pitch to brands, trying to bring on new partners as well as focusing on delivery. I think the best part about working for a football club is the opportunity to be creative, working collaboratively both internally and with brands to ideate on unique concepts. I love taking ideas to brands we work with and pitch new things, it’s the best part of my job! We really want to break the mould with what we do with partners, I will definitely be leaning on Dude Perfect for some content ideas!

It was a great season for the club on the field earning promotion back to the Premier League, what has it been like behind the scenes?

It has been great, there is such a buzz around the club at the moment and that energy transcends all the different departments. I’d also like to shout out our women’s team, they came incredibly close to promotion last season, we’re all hopeful they’ll follow the men with promotion this upcoming season. Thankfully, in my role, both our men’s and women’s teams’ success has supported us to have an extremely successful period of onboarding new partners as well. For us, it has really been an opportunity for us to supercharge our off field operation also.  

We continue to try and emulate that success we have seen on the pitch through exciting partnerships and business developments. We have introduced a brand new ecommerce site, slightly rebranded (you may notice the slight change in colour of our crest), and announced a unique partnership with Dude Perfect to combine and grow our youth audience, hopefully capturing new football fans and making them Burnley FC fans for life! We also continue to develop innovative transfer announcement videos with our amazing content and social team continuing to smash it out of the park. 

Everyone is really excited about the strategy we have for this season both on and off the pitch, we will do our best to achieve off the pitch and fingers crossed both Vinny and Rebecca can get the teams to do the magic on it.

It is obviously tricky to put a value on your sponsorship packages when you’re not sure whether you are going to be in the Premier League or in the EFL Championship. Tell us a bit about how that process works?

We were in quite a fortunate position because we had a good steer that we were probably going to get promoted from about half way through the season. I think the conversation very much depends on who you are speaking with. We are certainly leading conversations with the journey we are on as a club, we have made some really unique strides with the likes of JJ & Kealia coming on board as investors as well as working with Dude Perfect, so utilising this as a key way we value our proposition. Having this to leverage certainly assists in ensuring we have a stable level of outreach and impressions no matter which league we are in.

Our owners continue to work closely with us to evolve our story, we are improving on the infrastructure we have off the pitch to ensure great delivery for partners, we want to deliver no matter what happens on the pitch, and we have a clear strategy to deliver content and activations with this in mind ie. our Sky Documentary and further BTS content with our partners. These considerations have been a key part of valuing our assets, while also understanding that on-pitch success and the broadcast reach of the Premier League is a huge factor to valuing our key media facing assets and will in turn assist our owned channels growth. 

It is another big challenge to try and stay in the top division. With your partners how does a multi-year deal work when you can’t be certain what league you are going to be playing in?

Again, this is through open and honest conversations, as well as really leading with the journey we are on as a club and our story. This is something we have been really strong on as well in my opinion, and has been supported through the unique work we have done already.

I think it also comes back to understanding the different assets that are available in the EFL to the Premier League. For example, we have been flexible in the development of our contracts meaning that some partners will take up some on-kit assets if we are relegated, this is to ensure we still deliver value to them as a brand marketing tool even in The Championship. 

If you could work for another sports organisation, in or out of football, who would it be and why?

I think for me it would be the PGA Tour. I am a massive golf fan and the idea of touring with a sport I love is something that really appeals to me. I’d also love to end up in the USA at some point. 

That being said, I am really loving my time here at Burnley, and I truly thank the management and owners of the club who were willing to give me an opportunity at this truly amazing club. UTC!

Tom Brady announced as minor investor in Birmingham City

Tom Brady will become Chairman of the new Advisory Board, working directly with the Club’s Board and members of Birmingham City Football Club’s leadership team.

As Chairman of the Advisory Board, Brady will apply his extensive leadership experience and expertise across several components of the Club, including working alongside the sports science department to advise on health, nutrition, wellness, and recovery systems and programs. In addition, Brady will work closely with the Board and the management team on global marketing efforts and the identification of new commercial partnership opportunities for the Club.

An NFL legend who is universally recognised among the greatest players in league history, Brady retired in 2023 after 23 illustrious seasons. Among his innumerable accolades and accomplishments, Brady holds the record for most Super Bowl victories with seven and most Super MVPs with five. In addition, he earned the NFL Most Valuable Player Award three times, the NFL Offensive Player of the Year twice, and has been honoured with multiple ESPY Awards and Sports Illustrated Sportsperson of the Year distinctions, along with his naming to the NFL 100th Anniversary ‘All-Time Team.’

Even in retirement, Brady has continued his relentless pursuit of sporting excellence, and his passion for competition has culminated in several highly successful global endeavours with Knighthead across a variety of sports. In addition to the Birmingham City Ltd. partnership, Brady joined Knighthead’s ownership group for a Major League Pickleball team in 2022, and in March 2023, Brady’s lifestyle apparel clothing company, BRADY™, was announced as the Official Apparel Partner of Knighthead’s World Endurance Championship racing team, Hertz Team JOTA, which competed at the famed 24 Hours of Le Mans this past June. Taken together, these ventures are illustrative of Brady’s unyielding commitment to exercise his entrepreneurial instincts and to bridge the gap between athlete and entrepreneur.

Chairman of the Board, Tom Wagner, said: “Tom Brady joining the Birmingham City team is a statement of intent. We are setting the bar at world class. Tom is both investing and committing his time and extensive expertise. As Chair of the Advisory Board Tom will have a direct impact on the Club. The Men’s, Women’s, and Academy teams are going to benefit from the knowledge. The goal that Tom has committed to own is to make Birmingham City a respected leader in nutrition, health, wellness, and recovery across the world of football.

“A commitment to Blues fans was made on Monday 8 May 2023, to add experts from the world of sport and football to the team, putting in place the building blocks for future success. With Garry Cook as CEO, Hope Powell as Women’s Technical Director and now Tom Brady we are off to a fast start. Success does not come overnight. It takes time. But when you have great leaders in place everything becomes possible.” 

Tom Brady said: “Birmingham City is an iconic club with so much history and passion and to be part of the Blues is a real honour for me. BCFC is built on teamwork and determination and I’m excited to work alongside the board, management and players to make our Second City club second to none. I’ve been part of some amazing teams in my day, and I’m looking forward to applying my perspective to create that same success here in Birmingham.”