Paddy Power is kicking off the 2023-24 football season with a new tongue-in-cheek campaign, which exposes fans’ double standards when it comes to their clubs being taken over by billionaires.
Created by Bartle Bogle Hegarty, the 60-second TV spot opens in a pub where supporters of the fictitious Hardlypool FC are reacting to former England international Peter Crouch discussing the latest club takeover.
One of the fans then declares that their club has “something that money can’t buy” but is interrupted by another fan announcing that the team has just been bought by an oil baron and that they are now loaded.
At which point the pub-goers erupt into a revised version of Ginger Rogers’ We’re in the Money, with lyrics: “Gone are my ethics and gone are my fears, we’ve been mid-table for too many years.”
When the fans arrive at their posh new ground and attempt to buy a season ticket, however, they are told: “There’s a 12-year waiting list, mate.”
The campaign will run across social, out of home and radio with media planning and buying by EssenceMediacom.
Sportsbook at Paddy Power head of marketing Tow Muldowney said: “Football has put the oil in loyal of late, with fans changing their tune faster than Jordan Henderson when a Saudi-backed billionaire rolls up in their gold-plated sports car.
“We couldn’t resist a sheik-y dig at the utter absurdity of it all. And don’t even get me started on Jay-Z! But at the heart of this advert is the excitement of the start of season that fans of all clubs feel up and down the country. Football, you gotta love it.”
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