GambleAware, the problem-gambling awareness charity, tackles football betting with a powerful new campaign called ‘Can We Have Our Ball Back?’
Launched ahead of the UK’s famously hectic and busy festive football schedule, the spearhead spot features young players (including kids) playing football and then mysteriously finding that their balls had all disappeared.
The story arc culminates with the various players and teams eventually discovering that all their missing footballs accumulated on the roof of a betting shop.
The ad, which was created by agency And Rising, closes with a voiceover asking: “Is betting taking away our love of the game?”
The spot comes in 80-second,
70-second,
and 30-second versions.
The spearhead spot is also posted across Gamble Aware’s digital and social channels including Twitter
Today's the kick off for #CanWeHaveOurBallBack, an initiative to get us talking about the balance between football & betting. Check out the film & let us know what you think! More here: https://t.co/CFKiGT5rJp pic.twitter.com/85nIYnxfi9
— BeGambleAware (@BeGambleAware) November 26, 2018
and Facebook.
The core film is supported with additional content amplified across the organisation’s social channels.
Politicians have recently said that gambling company logos shouldn't appear on players' shirts. Do you agree? #CanWeHaveOurBallBack pic.twitter.com/dWRLhstgQl
— BeGambleAware (@BeGambleAware) November 29, 2018
Do you think that gambling is taking away our love of the game? #CanWeHaveOurBallBack pic.twitter.com/nBGcfItopa
— BeGambleAware (@BeGambleAware) November 27, 2018
The campaign was created for the not-for-profit by an And Rising team led by Toby Roberts and Julie Herskin and the lead commercial was helmed by Scott Lyon through Outsider and post by the Electric Theatre Collective and recording handled at factory Studios.
Comment:
This is the first football focused campaign from an organisation that launched its own ‘Gamification Of Sport’ manifesto video earlier in the year,
and in 2017 launched the powerful ‘Machine’ spot.
A timely campaign as it coincides with the latest data that shows 60% of clubs in the top two divisions in English football have betting brands as a shirt sponsor: with nine of 20 in the Premier League and 17 of the 24 Championship clubs.
While US sports is in the midst of a gambling gold rush (with a new, self-declared game-changing deal league/team deal seemingly signed every 24 hours), the UK and the EU seems to be in a process of reconsidering its liberal approach to gambling marketing with more pressure groups and political enquiries appearing on a regular basis.
Where it will lead is anyone’s guess.
But we all remember the tobacco sports sponsorship endgame!
Links:
GambleAware
https://about.gambleaware.org/
https://www.facebook.com/BeGambleAware/
https://twitter.com/begambleaware
https://www.linkedin.com/company/responsible-gambling-trust
And Rising
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