Best football adverts

[Anton Gramscescu]

We almost never get the good ones in North America - often I only see them in the Cannes yearly "best adverts" thing.

But having just seen a Pepsi commerical in which a number of shape-shifting football players play kickabout in what appears to be Waterloo Station, (which was cute but not brilliant) I got to wondering about what the best ever football advert was.

My second favourite was the series from the 2002 World Cup directed by Terry Gilliam, with Cantona as a bizarre MC presiding over a series of cage matches in an oil tanker. Pretty good, except the winning goal was scored by Thierry Henry with his head, which was one suspension of disbelief too far for me.

Favourite was "The Mission", featuring a Thuram/Davids/Figo/etc. commando raid on that famous facist buliding in Rome, with Louis van Gaal in the getaway van/helicopter. The robot Samurai guarding the Nike ball gave the whole thing a pleasantly surrealist touch.

What are your faves?

[ursus arctos]

Best football adverts

I will admit to really enjoying the original Nike Brasil "Airport" advert, which also marked the absolute pinnacle of Denilson's career.

I've never seen the first or third of your list.

[Anton Gramscescu]

Best football adverts

The Mission

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Best football adverts

The oil tanker ones were superb.

There's a series of ads for Carling? Carlsberg? (Shows how much advertising does for me) with a supposed "pub team" for the "Old Lion", where the assorted ranks of Peter Shilton, Peter Beardsley, the Charltons and Chrissy Waddle all turn out for the village pub, which is quite amusing.

I also like the Gillette advert where Tiger Woods, Roger Federer and Thierry Henry are portrayed as "the best a man can get", which while not strictly football related, is quite comical inasmuch as at one point Woods and Federer turn to regard Henry as if to intimate, "who the fuck is this bloke?", which would be about right.

[Anton Gramscescu]

Best football adverts

I've only ever seen the print campaign for the Gilette ads. All three dressed in black, they are meant to be dark and suave in a mysterious/dangerous kind of way. Which Henry and Federer can just about pull off; Woods looks about as dangerous as Winnie the Pooh.

[Guest]

Best football adverts

The best football ad was in print for 90 minutes magazine.

"De Kock, Suker, Fuchs, Kuntz......and some other footballers"

[ursus arctos]

Best football adverts

Sky Italia tends to dominate the field here:

If you love football, football loves you.

With Sky, you'll never be without your heroes.

Campioni del Mondo! (starring Caressa and Bergomi, their number one commentary team).

Another take with Toni, Cannavaro and Pirlo.

The Best Vintage Ever!

[EIM]

Best football adverts

- The cage matches on a tanker.

- Nike's World Wide Wall ad

- Nike's Good v Evil match (my fave - Au Revoir, indeed)

[EIM]

Best football adverts

My second favourite was the series from the 2002 World Cup directed by Terry Gilliam, with Cantona as a bizarre MC presiding over a series of cage matches in an oil tanker. Pretty good, except the winning goal was scored by Thierry Henry with his head, which was one suspension of disbelief too far for me.

That ended up not being the winning goal. They had a second advert, a rematch, where they played first to 100 without the cage.

[EIM]

Best football adverts

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=tIBZSlkC09I - Here it is.

[Anton Gramscescu]

Best football adverts

I like watching these ads partly because I'd forgotten what some of these players used to look like (Maldini looks about 18 in that good v evil commercial), and to remind yourself what kinds of players were considered "stars" (e.g. cage match participants...I get Seol because of the Korean angle, but Wiltord? Denilson?)

[Anton Gramscescu]

Best football adverts

a rematch, where they played first to 100 without the cage.

Fucking French refs, making up the rules as they go along, and then allowing a match to be played in unsafe conditions...

[EIM]

Best football adverts

Of course, all the great adverts have a common link. Eric Cantona. But this isn't just true of adverts, it's true of life. But let's leave life to one side for a minute, as I chose to all those years ago, and concentrate on Eric in adverts. Other than the Nike ads (his continual flirtation with Nike is the one question mark that I allow to hang over his head) here are some classic Cantona ads:

Eric camping it up in grand style for bic razors -

Eric getting all Happy Gilmore on the golf course -

Eric prattling on about seagulls and sardines -

Is this an advert or some troubling insight to my troubled psyche? -

[Guest]

Best football adverts

About ten years ago, Diadora ran a series of full-page ads in football magazines featuring the faces of Roy Keane and Nicky Butt imprinted on red brickwork. The tagline was "Remember when you played football against a brick wall . . ."

[Ant van Oviedo]

Best football adverts

There are no "good" adverts. They are all dreamed up by marketing and advertising executives in shiny suits, in an attempt to screw some more cash out of you. Just say no.

[Big Daves Gussett]

Best football adverts

They're not all bad, Ant...

[The Purple Cow]

Best football adverts

"My second favourite was the series from the 2002 World Cup directed by Terry Gilliam, with Cantona as a bizarre MC presiding over a series of cage matches in an oil tanker. Pretty good, except the winning goal was scored by Thierry Henry with his head, which was one suspension of disbelief too far for me."

My mate Lorenzo Da Rita wrote that ad, and my other mate and former colleague Guido van der Meersche won a Clio (the advertising equivalent of the Oscars) award for producing it. The filming was done in a warehouse in Paris, and the CGI work was done in northern Norway, inside the arctic circle.

Just thought you should know.

Lorenzo also wrote the 'Footballitis' ad for Adidas.

**

Another friend (and former business partner) of mine Giles Montgomery kicked off his career when he came up with this ad. It took him from a small Huddersfield agency to the bright lights of London.

[Guest]

Best football adverts

Lorenzo also wrote the 'Footballitis' ad for Adidas.


No offence to your mate, but those ads were bloody awful.

Another print ad I liked was when Northern Rock started sponsoring Newcastle. The ad consisted simply of a picture of a Newcastle shirt. The text was: "It's true. Sooner or later, we all end up dressing like our fathers."

[The Purple Cow]

Best football adverts

"No offence to your mate, but those ads were bloody awful."

Doesn't matter what you think, they were the ads that made him, paved the way to the Volvo work.

[Guest]

Best football adverts

Doesn't matter what you think

Yep -- after all, I'm only the consumer.

[The Purple Cow]

Best football adverts

You clearly weren't the consumer.

[Guest]

Best football adverts

Well, I certainly wasn't going to be after watching an ad as terrible as that.

[The Purple Cow]

Best football adverts

Ok, this is going to develop into one of those arguments, so let's knock it on the head right now.

[Jon]

Best football adverts

It is funny who they choose for those ads, isn't it?

Zoltan 'choked 2 years running at Wembley' Gera is in one
for Pepsi alongside beckham, Roberto Carlos et al, as he is Hungary's captain.

[ursus arctos]

Best football adverts

TPC, within the industry itself is there an appreciation of adverts that "work" aesthetically without necessarily "working" commercially? I'm thinking of the rather common experience among "civilians" of having loved an advert without being capable of recalling the product being sold.